The Runaway
by acw28
Summary: Star Butterfly is the only princess from another dimensional living in Echo Creek, or so everyone believes. But what if there was another princess who, for her own reasons, ran way from her home dimension? What if Marco already met this princess, but just didn't know it?
1. The Beginning

**Updated 8/3/2015 - Corrected a few misspellings**

 **Hello everyone. I'm acw28, here to welcome you to my new story!**

 **So first off, to those who have read my other work and decided to give this story a chance, I say thank you. I understand that the show doesn't exactly line up with the previous fandoms that I've wrote about before. That said, I am a fan of** _ **Star vs. the Forces of Evil**_ **, it is extremely funny and has some of the best action/fight scenes that I've seen in recent years, which is why I highly recommend it to anyone who has yet to see an episode (they're easily found online). If I lost a person because of what show I choose to write, then that's their choice. I'm not going to force a person to read a story they hold no interest in.**

 **Now to the fans of** _ **Star vs. the Forces of Evil**_ **, welcome to my story! This story is a result of an idea that popped in my head when I first saw one of the characters and is also partially inspired by some amazing fan art done by mgx0, feel free to look it up but be warned it may lead to spoilers. I'll try my best to capture the hilarity of the show in my writing, but I make no promises.**

 **Now to everyone, I hope you enjoy the story.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't have a witty way to say I don't own** _ **Star vs. the Forces of Evil.**_

* * *

It was a normal Friday at Echo Creek High School. Currently two students were walking in the hallway toward their next class. One, a blond girl wearing a light blue sleeveless dress with a decorative red belt, as well as blue stockings along with furry leg warmers above light blue sneakers. However, what truly made this girl stand out from the crowd was her devil horned headband and the pink hearts present on both of her cheeks. This is Star Butterfly, a magical princess from another dimension. As the girl started skipping, she said, "Oh Marco, how I love Fridays! The weekend is right around the corner but you still get to see all your friends from school."

"I wouldn't be too excited Star." The boy, Marco Diaz, said. The brown haired and eyed boy had tanned skin as well as a mole on his right cheek and wore a red, zipped up hoodie along with dark grey pants. While the two freshmen walked into the classroom, Marco continued by saying, "It's the first Friday of the month. That means that Miss Skullnick will have…"

Marco was interrupted when a large, green, red head troll wearing a purple blouse with the sleeves ripped off and leopard print pants yelled out, "Time for the First Friday Quiz. I hope all of you brats studied or are prepared to suffer!" With that, the troll began to pass out the quiz.

As always, Marco was doing well, answering the questions quickly and correctly, the class was only half over and yet he was almost done. Star on the other hand, was not doing as well. She had only answered the first half of the quiz, and she wasn't even sure if she got those answers right. As the princess chewed on her pencil in nervousness, the door to the classroom was kicked open. Moving quickly into the room was a small, green, bipedal bird-like creature with a small cow skull on its head, lead a number of other monsters into the room.

"Hello Star Butterfly," the creature began, "I, Ludo, have come to steal your wand while you are sufficiently distracted!" Ludo threw his arms upwards as he said this, then paused and turned to his army and asked, "She is distracted this time, right?" to which a number of his monsters said yes.

'Yes!' Star thought. 'I can get out of having to do this stupid quiz and I get to kick some butt before the weekend, this is a win-win!'

However, Star's hopes were dashed when Miss Skullnick got up from behind the desk and began commanding Ludo and his minions, "Get out of my classroom, the brats are in the middle of a quiz!"

Ludo seemed to shrink under the troll's words as he said, "But I'm trying to conquer an entire dimension."

"I don't care, you can wait out in the hall until after the rest of the students are done with their tests, then you can play with your friends."

Ludo looked ready to protest being Star's "friend", but a look from the troll made him to, wisely, decide to take his army out into the hall and wait for the bell to ring. Miss Skullnick nodded to herself, happy with her work. She then turned to see all the occupants of the room looking at her. "Well what are you waiting for?" the troll asked, "Get back to work!" Instantly all the students went back to their quiz.

As the bell rang, Star weakly got out of her chair. She was glad to finish the quiz, half the class never could, and just hoped most of her answers would be correct. As she was about to walk out the door, Marco call out, "Star, are you sure that's such a good idea?"

"What do you mean Marco, it's just Ludo, we beat him all the time."

"Right," Marco began, "but you're wiped from taking the quiz, and who's to say that Ludo hasn't set a trap for us."

"So then what do you suggest?" Star asked.

Marco pointed behind his back to the room's windows and said, "Let's not use the door to get out of here."

* * *

In the Hallway

"What is taking her so long?" Ludo questioned his nearest henchmen, Buff Frog, a large bipedal frog with spiked shoulder pads and a green shirt. The silent henchmen looked at his master and shrugged his shoulders. A voice from the back of the group said, "The Princess just slipped out the window and is heading towards the school's exit!"

"What!" Ludo yelled. Seeing how nobody was moving, the evil creature jumped on Buff Frog's head and said, "Well what are you all waiting for, an invitation? Let's go get me that wand!" With his last command, Ludo pointed forward as his army charged through the school's halls.

* * *

"You were right, Marco. It was so much easier just to sneak out through the window." Star said as she smiled at the beautiful day.

"You do know that eventually Ludo's going to find out we snuck out right?" Marco asked.

"Oh don't worry about it." Star waved off her friends concern. "It's been long enough that I'm not stressing out about that quiz now. I'll be ready for Ludo and his monsters now."

"We'll see about that!" A voice form behind the duo said. Turing around, both Star and Marco saw Ludo charging along with his monster. The smallest of the group then pointed forward and yelled, "GET THEM!"

As Star brought her wand forward, Marco settled into his karate stance. Marco jumped when the aptly named Big Chicken dive bombed him, only for the monster to be knocked out when Star cried, "Dagger Crystal Heart Attack!" and shot a multitude of sharp, half hearts from her wand. Marco then jumped away from Star as he dodged Spikeball's round spiked hands. After a few minutes of this, Marco managed to land a flip kick on the tall monster while Star used a "Narwhal Blast" against an equally large, blue skinned, horned, bearded monster.

As the two fought the invading monsters, a number of the students who were getting out of school gathered and decided to watch the fight. Everyone knew that this was an almost weekly occurrence, a byproduct of having the exchange student being from another dimension, yet few actually got to see the monster fights. The crowd got into it, cheering when Star hit Bearicorn in the face and warned Marco when Three-eyed Potato Baby tried to sneak up on him, which the boy responded with a flurry of punches to the monster's stomach, but had to stop when he heard Star start another spell.

"Nuclear Butterfly…"

"Star, Stop!" Marco yelled.

"What, why?" Star asked, wand glowing and held high above her head.

"We're at school," Marco explained, "if you do a powerful spell like that it'll destroy the place."

Star frowned, not seeing how this would be a problem, but said, "Fine." Before she smiled and went back to kicking Bearicorn. Marco smiled at his victory, but while he was distracted, he was pounced on by Buff Frog, who began to choke the boy. Marco tried to hit the henchmen, but the monster's head was out of reach and his legs were pinned. Not being able to call out for help, and with his vision fading, Marco desperately reached around for something. When his left hand made contact with something solid, he quickly grabbed it with both hands and swung with all his might, hearing a satisfying crack as the hands around his throat loosened.

Getting up, Marco noted that Star had defeated the rest of the minions while Buff Frog laid unmoving at his feet, while Ludo kicked the knocked out henchmen over and over muttering about all of them being disappointments. Eventually the tiny tyrant ran out of energy and, using his dimensional scissors, opened a portal back to his dimension that his henchmen limped through, with two monsters dragging Buff Frog.

"Marco!" Star said as she held her hand up for a high five. "We did it again!"

Marco smiled as he gave Star a high five, only then did he see what he had used to knock Buff Frog out with. Still being held in his left hand was half a light blue skateboard, half a heart in the middle where it was broken.

'Oh no, not again.' the boy thought. His fears where confirmed when a girl with blond hair that had a light green streak, light green eyes, three freckles on each cheek, and wearing a white shirt with dark green sleeves, a seashell necklace, shorts, and knee high socks held up the other half of the skate board and said, "Marco, you broke my skateboard….again."

"Jackie, I'm…" but before he could say anything else he was interrupted by said girl as she said, "Don't worry, I'll just deal with it." and started to walk away.

Marco hung his head in shame as Star walked next to him. "Broke Jackie's skateboard again?" She asked, not seeing the event happen. Marco nodded sadly. Putting a reassuring arm around her friend's shoulder Star said, "It was in the middle of a monster fight, I'm sure she'll understand." This didn't help Marco any, as he began to walk home.

* * *

Saturday

"Come on Marco, this is the millionth store that we've been to." Star exclaimed as she waved her arms dramatically. It was the weekend and she wanted to do something fun, like going to a party dimension.

"It's only the third store Star." Marco said, chuckling slightly at his friends antics before he began looking for something.

"Why are we even here?" Star questioned. "You don't even skateboard."

True, this was the third skate shop that Marco had dragged Star to that day, and the boy had refused to tell the other dimensional princess what he was looking for, always giving the same answer that he did now, "There's a reason why we're here but you'll have to be patient to see it."

Star however was not paying attention, having been distracted by a display that showed a video of light up wheels. Marco gave a small laugh before he continued looking. After a few minutes, Marco found what he was looking for and asked the clerk how much the item was.

"Sixty bucks kid."

Marco gave a slight sigh as he reached into his wallet and removed all of his cash. Even if he was now broke it was still the right thing to do. After collecting his purchase, and dragging Star away from the video, Marco stated walking towards the local skate park.

"Are you going to tell me what you got now?" Star asked.

"I got Jackie a new board since I broke her old one. Okay, happy now?" Marco asked.

"But you broke it during a monster fight, if a person watches those they know any and all personal property is at risk of being destroyed."

"Maybe in Mewni, but not here." Marco replied. "Besides, I never got her a replacement the first time I broke her board so it's the right thing to replace it now. Now will you help me find Jackie, the faster we get this done the quicker you can drag me off to some other dimension."

"She's over there." Star pointed to a group of picnic tables where a food truck was stationed near the ramp and bowl, Jackie was sitting at one of the tables and watching other skaters pulling off different tricks. Marco suddenly became nervous about talking to his crush, when Star saw this she rolled her eyes and decided to take the initiative. Dragging Marco behind her, Star waved her hand as she called out, "Hey Jackie!"

This immediately gained the girl's attention as she turned her head and called back, "Hey Star," and seeing Marco said in a lower voice, "Oh, hey Marco." When the two got closer to the skater girl, Jackie said, "Not to be rude, but I know you two don't skate, so why are you here?"

Seeing how Marco was still slightly frozen from having his crush actually talk to him, Star, either wanting to help her friend or cause him embarrassment, said, "Marco wanted to give you something."

"Oh?" Jackie asked. Raising an eyebrow at the teen, Jackie said, "And just what did you want to give me?"

Marco was silent for a few moments, not sure what to say. Finally, he just settled on saying, "Here." and held out his bag. Jackie hesitantly took it from the boy's hands and reached inside, pulling out a new skateboard identical to her broken one. "Wow, you found a board exactly like my old one. Must have taken you forever."

Marco shrugged his shoulders as he said, "It's Saturday and I've got nothing better to do, and I do owe you a board since I broke your last one."

"I may have been a bit bummed out about it, but you didn't need to get me a replacement," Jackie said as she took a step closer to Marco, "and it did get broken during a fight, it wasn't your fault."

Marco scratched the back of his neck as he said, "Maybe, but I did break the one before that." although he quickly regretted saying as such not wanting to bring back memories of that day.

"Don't sweat it, you were just having a bad day." Jackie said offhandedly.

"That obvious?"

"You had a black eye, had a newspaper covering your ripped hoodie, and had that annoying kid hovering next to you."

"Yeah, Jeremy really is a pain in the neck."

By now Star had her arms cross and was tapping her foot impatiently. It was Saturday, meaning she didn't have school, could goof off all day, and let her homework sit in her backpack until Sunday night. Knowing of her friend's crush, Star said, "Come on Marco! Ask her out or kiss her already, we've got things to do."

Marco quickly blushed and wheeled around, not noticing Jackie's blush, and yelled at his friend, "Star!"

"What?" the princess asked. "You know you want to, I'm just speeding things along."

Marco turned back to Jackie, by now both had their blushes under control. Scratching the back of his head, the boy said, "The crazy things that girl says," Marco continued talking as he walked backwards, "well see you later Jackie."

Unfortunately, no one in the group noticed a skater in the bowl had wiped out during the conversation. As he was walking away, Marco stepped on the abandoned skateboard. Somehow keeping his footing, Marco ended up riding the board down into the bowl while flailing his arms. Instantly both girls were concerned for the "Safety Kid's" safety and cried out, "Marco!"

What happened next could only be described as amazing. As Marco was on a collision course with the downed skater, he kick flipped over the other teen. Sticking the landing, Marco continued moving toward the other side of the bowl. Both girls feared he'd be hit by other skaters, only for Marco to dodge each one at the last second. When the boy came to the lip of the bowl, he did a quick grind before going back into the bowl and skating back towards the girls. When he was back on the side where the girls were standing, Marco popped up, did a back flip, and landed on his feet in front of Star and Jackie, board in hand.

Time seemed to freeze for a few moments as both girls stared awestruck at what they had just witnessed. As Star was about to recover and ask how Marco did that, said boy dropped the borrowed skateboard and ran to the nearest trashcan, depositing his breakfast into the metal bin. After cleaning his mouth with some napkins from the food truck, Marco calmly walked back to the girls, grabbed Stars arm and started dragging her away as he said over his shoulder, "Well, have a good day Jackie. We would stay and chat, but as Star said we have things to do."

Jackie could only stare at the boy and nod her head at what he said. After Marco and Star had left the park, Jackie was recovered enough to have some thought process. 'How could a beginner like Marco do all of that and not wreck?' Jackie asked herself. 'Could Marco be the person I'm looking for, could Marco be him?'

* * *

 **Well this turned out to be my shortest chapter yet at a little over six pages. That's probably going to be the pattern for this story. I tend to unconsciously write a little like the source material, and the show that this fic is based on is shorter and has less of an overarching story than my other sources of inspiration.**

 **So how was the first chapter? To my regular readers, does it hold up to the expectations that you have for my work? To the** _ **Star vs the Forces of Evil**_ **fans, does it capture enough spirit of the show? Leave a review and let me know what you thought, I'll give an answer to any question that the first review with an account has, or if anyone has a question I feel warrants an answer (which is usually every question).**

 **I know I've probably angered some readers with my choice to focus on this story, so here's a look into my crazy head with what I have tentatively scheduled as far as updates go. As I picture this story as being four to six chapters, I'm going to devote my full attention to it and get it done. Once I'm done with this, I'll begin alternating updates between** _ **Son of the Sun**_ **and** _ **A New Realm**_ **again. Based on the poll on my profile, and the number of reviews, follows, and favorites, I'm going to update** _ **Son of the Sun**_ **first as it seems to be my most popular story and I want to reward my readers who have to put up with my insanity. Then after I post chapter ten of** _ **A New Realm**_ **or get done with the Chunin Exams in said story, I'm going to start a new story. Based on the poll at the time of this writing, it appears to be** _ **Kitsune of the Moon**_ **. If you want to see something else published first, make your voice heard and go vote. I'm planning to leave the poll open until late August, early September, so you still have time to try to change my mind. So again, thank you all for reading my work and putting up with my insanity and I hope you enjoy my work in all its forms.**

 **In other good news, I finished my summer course last week, and as long as I got a B on the last paper I should be passing with an A. Now I'm going to have a lot more free time to just relax/write.**

 **So, now that this story has started, there are a few questions left in the air, such as…**

 **Will Marco ever ask Jackie out?**

 **How can Marco skate so well?**

 **Who is Jackie looking for?**

 **The answers to these questions and more will, hopefully, be answered in the coming chapters. But for now, this is acw28 saying, "until next update."**


	2. A Helping Hand and Home Movies

**Updated 7/8/2015 - Fixed a grammar mistake**

 **Hey everyone, it's acw28 back with the next chapter of** _ **The Runaway**_ **!**

 **This is actually a little odd that I get to write a bit more so soon. I've only had an account for a little over half a year. In that time I managed to write around ten total chapters, but I usually had to wait a week and a half between each chapter because I had varying amounts of school work that I needed to get done. In fact, until just recently I was in the middle of a summer course that I passed with an A. So, now that it's the middle of summer that means there isn't as many games coming out or shows on TV that are worth watching, which means more reading and writing for me.**

 **So after some though, I decided that this story is definitely going to last for four chapters. I can't guarantee the chapter length will be consistent, one might be shorter and one might be longer. For once I actually have the entire plot of a story almost entirely planned out, and I intend to stick with my plan, but I will try to have my chapters be a minimum of three pages.**

 **Before we begin, I would like to say thank you to all those who have followed, favorited, reviewed, or have just enjoyed the story. I looked at the stats and in the seven or so days that I've had this story on the site I've received 234 views, surprisingly it's also gotten more visitors in this month, so far, than my other stories. Remember, if you liked what you read, consider leaving a review, I'm always interested in what my readers think. Now with all of that out of the way, let's move on to the story.**

 **Disclaimer: If I owned the show this story is based on, than** _ **Star vs. the Forces of Evil**_ **wouldn't be on hiatus every other month.**

* * *

It was mid-afternoon by the time the events at the skate park had concluded. While the two teens where walking home, Star kept repeating the same thing. "How did you do that?"

"I have no idea what you are talking about." was Marco's reply.

"How did you do that?"

"Do what?" Marco asked as he continued walking home.

"The thing with the skate board where you jumped over that other dude, slid along the side of the bowl, and didn't get hit!" Star practically yelled as she threw her arms out, wanting to know how her friend did something so amazing.

Marco shrugged as he placed his arms behind his head, "I don't know, guess I just got lucky."

"Marco no one gets that lucky. It'd be lucky if you managed to not fall of the board. But I've seen Youtube videos, what you did requires months if not years of practice."

By now the conversation had carried both teens to the Diaz's front door. Marco sighed as he began to open the door and said, "Look Star, maybe it was luck that I could do all of the things that I did, maybe there was a reason. All that I know is that I don't want to talk about this anymore."

As the two teens walked into the house, they were immediately greeted by Mr. and Mrs. Diaz. "Star, Marco you've been gone all day." Mrs. Diaz said. "Yes," Mr. Diaz continued, "you said you had something to buy, but we expected you to be home earlier. No matter, dinner's almost ready and I hope you're hungry."

A few short minutes later, the family of three and their guest were gathered around the table. Unlike when she had large formal dinners in Mewni, conversation came easy to Star when she was at the Diaz table.

"So how was your day Mr. Diaz?"

"Great Star, I managed to find a great deal on some scrap metal I can use for a new sculpture."

"And I finally found a buyer for that huge, stone, Star head you made weeks ago." While the conversation might seem weird to a normal family, it was perfectly normal for the Diaz home. Marco's father had a full time job at a local office complex, but usually could be found on the weekends in the shed working on some art project. Mrs. Diaz worked as a secretary, but often found buyers for her husband's work. Mr. Diaz actually had quite a bit of talent, enough for the family to have a sizeable amount of extra income, useful whenever Star's fights with Ludo caused the back yard to become a crater.

"That sounds nice, all me and Marco did was go to some stores and then the skate park."

Instantly both Mr. and Mrs. Diaz seemed to freeze momentarily before Mrs. Diaz asked in a strained voice, "Really, Marco took you skating today?"

Marco was instantly waving his hands as he said, "No I didn't, I just went there so I could give Jackie a board to replace the one I broke on Friday. I talked to her for a bit then me and Star left, no skating."

"But what about when you stepped on that guy's board?" Star asked.

Marco felt his dad's stare as he said, "That was a complete accident, I had no intention of skating at all."

"I see." Mr. Diaz slowly said, the usually cheerfulness in his voice absent. "Well it sounds like you two had quite the exciting day, luckily no one was hurt." The man suddenly smiled widely as he said, "Now, who's ready for some of my wife's famous meatloaf?"

* * *

After dinner, Star and Marco were washing the dishes. Star was still perplexed about the shift in the mood of the entire Diaz family at the mention of Marco skate boarding. Seeing that Mr. and Mrs. Diaz were preoccupied in the back yard, and concerned for her friend, Star asked, "Marco, there is a reason why you could do all those things today isn't there?"

Marco nodded slowly, but didn't give a verbal response. Trying a different approach, Star asked, "If you could do all this entire time why not go to the skate park more often, Jackie would have fallen for you in an instant. You saw how impressed she was."

Putting down the sponge, Marco said, "Look Star, maybe I did skate a little in the past, but that's what it is, the past. Some things happened, really bad things, and I decided I didn't want to skate anymore."

"I guess you're not going to tell me what happened are you?"

Marco sighed as he walked into the living room. Kneeling down, the boy walked over to a shelf filled with a multitude of DVDs, both films and home movies. Finding what he was looking for, Marco slide a single case off the shelf before giving it to Star. "Whatever you do, don't let my parents see you watching that." He then began walking toward the front door, causing Star to ask, "Where are you going?"

"It's been a long day and I'm going to go for a jog to clear my head. I'll be back in about an hour, call my phone if you need anything."

Once Marco had left, Star looked at the case in her hands, wondering what was so terrible to cause the normally happy Diaz family to become so on edge. Also, how was she supposed to watch this, she knew how the DVD player worked, but either parent could walk in at any moment. Not knowing what to do, she settled for hiding the DVD in her room until she could figure this out.

* * *

Marco had been jogging for around forty-five minutes, but the day's events were still fresh in his mind. He remembered skating down into the bowl, how the wind felt in his face, how he still got that slight adrenaline rush when he did a trick, but he also remembered the incident. He stopped along a short cliff that ended with a small beach and the ocean, trying but failing to stop his thoughts. The boy was about ready to yell in frustration when a voice called out, "Hey Marco, what's up?"

Turning around, Marco was greeted by the sight of Jackie skating by, but stopping next to the boy and picking up her skateboard to have an actual conversation. Much like that afternoon, Marco initially didn't know what to say to his crush, but decided to say, "Hey Jackie, breaking in the new board?"

"Yeah, still needs a little more wear and tear 'til I'm comfortable with it. What about you, not many people go out in the middle of the night to jog."

Marveling at the fact that this was once of the longest conversations he'd had with the girl without stuttering, Marco said, "Just trying to clear my head of a few things."

"Is this about what you did at the park today?" Marco nodded his head as he said, "And now I suppose you want to know how I could do that."

Instead Jackie surprised him by saying, "Actually, I'm good." Seeing the question in Marco's eyes, Jackie said, "It's obvious that you skated for a while, but I guess something happened and you stopped. It's cool dude, everyone has something in their past they don't want to talk about."

"Thanks Jackie." Somehow, just with that short conversation, the weight of the world seemed to fall off of Marco's shoulders.

"It's no problem Marco." Jackie replied as she smiled. "Well I've got to get home, see ya later Marco." As Jackie took a step back along the edge of the cliff to start heading home, the ground underneath gave way. Instantly the girl went flying backwards, rolling down the cliff and onto the beach, her legs landing in the water and her board in the sand. Luckily the cliff was only around eight feet high, but the slightly jagged rocks created another problem.

"Jackie, are you okay?" Marco questioned.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Jackie replied.

"Hang on, I'll be down in a second." As Marco knelt down to start climbing down the cliff, he was stopped when Jackie yelled, "No, Marco! Stay up there!"

"Why?"

Jackie blushed as she said, "The cliff ripped my shirt off." Only now did Marco realize that Jackie was laying on her stomach and using her arms to help cover her chest. Being the kind person he was, Marco quickly though of a way to help.

Jackie was beginning to wonder how she was going to make it home when she heard a small thump. Looking forward, Jackie saw that something red was covering her skateboard. Looking up, Jackie saw that Marco was now missing his iconic red hoodie, having only a grey shirt covering his torso. "I think you need that more than me right now, just get it back to me when you can." Both were quite for a moment before Marco continued saying, "Well, I think I'm going to head home now, have a good night Jackie." and left the girl so she could have some privacy.

Once she was sure Marco had left, Jackie reached out to grab the hoodie and quickly put it on. 'Well that was nice of Marco, I'll have to thank him later. Now, how to get home? Should I try to climb the cliff or just stay down here?' Seeing that nobody was around, Jackie thought to herself, 'It's been awhile since I've had a good swim anyway. I just hope Janna left the back door unlocked this time.' as she grabbed her board.

* * *

Sunday had surprisingly been a calm day for Jackie. She got her homework done, made sure that Marco's hoodie was washed and by her backpack, and admittedly stayed up a little too late watching random fails on Youtube. That was why she was currently sleeping in her bed, that is until Janna, a girl with tan skin, dark blue hair, brown eyes, and a green beanie as well as a green shirt, blue jacket, and yellow skirt, woke her up saying, "Come on Jackie, it's almost eight."

That instantly caused Jackie to sit up in bed. Looking at the clock in her room, Jackie realized that Janna was right. The girl quickly got out of bed, got dressed, grabbed an apple and a piece of toast, put her backpack on, and inadvertently Marco's hoodie as well, grabbed her skate board and quickly rushed off to school.

Meanwhile back at the house, Janna calmly walked down to the kitchen to enjoy a bowl of cereal, noting the correct time on the stove clock and saw that she had plenty of time before school. She did consider going early to see what mayhem her plan would bring, but decided she could wait and would just take the bus like every other day.

Jackie was so concerned about being late that it wasn't until she got to the school that she checked the time on her phone. '6:30!' the girl mentally yelled. 'Great, Janna changed my room's clock, again. Oh well, the pool should still be drained so I can skate there for a while.'

However, Jackie was not the only student to arrive early, the science club had an early meeting and one of the sports teams had an early practice, meaning many of the cheerleaders also showed up early to watch. As she skated past the assembled nerds, jocks, and cheerleaders, Jackie didn't know that they all stopped in the middle of their conversations as they saw her wearing a familiar red hoodie. Once Jackie was out of sight, each student pulled out their phones to spread the latest gossip.

* * *

As Marco and Star walked off the bus, Marco asked, "Was it just me or was everyone looking at me funny today?" For a change he wasn't wearing his usual hoodie. Even with the one he loaned to Jackie over the weekend he still had several more in his closet, but he simply just didn't feel like wearing one.

Star took a thinking pose and tapped her wand on her chin three times before saying, "Now that you mention it, everyone's phones went off almost simultaneously, then everyone started looking at you. Usually that only happens to me, and that's only after I accidently turn something into a monster."

Before the conversation could go any further, two boys, one a chunky red head wearing a black V-neck and grey sweat pants the other having brown hair, glasses, and a blue and white striped shirt, ran up to the duo. "Marco!" The red head, Ferguson, yelled. "You lucky bastard you! Way to go man, I knew you could do it!"

The other boy, Alfonzo, gave Marco a notepad and a pencil as he said, "You have achieved the impossible and given hope to us all. Please leave me something nice in your will."

By know the boy was only more confused but Star was the one to ask the question, "Just what is going on? Why is everyone acting so crazy?"

"Everyone is going crazy because of this." Alfonzo said as he showed Marco and Star a photo of Jackie skating in one of the outdoor walkways of the school while she was wearing Marco's hoodie. After Marco and Star had stared at the photo for a few minutes, Ferguson said, "And I repeat myself, way to go you lucky bastard."

"Wait, you two think me and Jackie are going out?" Marco asked, the events of the morning finally making sense.

"Well aren't you?" Alfonzo asked. "She's wearing your jacket, that's the most accepted and cliché way of announcing you're going out with someone aside from lip locking with them in front of the entire school."

"No, no, no." Marco said as he shook his head. "This is all a misunderstanding. I ran into Jackie last Saturday night and talked for a bit. She said she was getting cold so I let her borrow my hoodie. We're not going out." Marco said, stretching the truth a little to save Jackie some embarrassment.

"So it's all a misunderstanding?" Ferguson asked, getting a nod from Marco and Star. "That be a problem since _it_ has been declared."

Marco instantly paled. Star was about to ask what _it_ is, but stopped when she saw a large mob of boys suddenly appeared, being led by Justin, the blond, blue eyed overly buff quarterback of the school's football team. "There he is. Men of Echo Creek High, charge!" As one the entire mob surged forward while chanting "BRO CODE!" Marco immediately took off running, barely staying a head of the rampaging teenagers.

Once the area was clear, Star quickly grabbed Alfonzo and asked, "What is going on?"

"A Bro Code has been declared." Alfonzo said. Seeing the confusion on Star's face, he elaborated by saying, "When the school was founded there was a disproportionate amount of male students to females, obviously that lead to a lot of conflict." Alfonzo paused to take a breath. "To fix that a rule known as the 'Bro Code' was implemented, if a group of boys believe that a boy is going out with a girl that is too far out of his league, they can form a mob and chase and or fight said boy until it's either proven he is in her league or breaks up."

Star was horrified when she heard this, Marco may be able to fight off Ludo's goons, but with practically the entire male population of the school chasing after him, who knew how long he could last. "We've got to go help him!"

"Can't," Ferguson said, "a Bro Code is a duel between one man and a group. Even though we would support him if he was going out with Jackie, we can't do anything. Neither can you since the only girl that can interfere is the one the duel is about."

As soon as Ferguson was done speaking, Star dropped Alfonzo and immediately went rush off as she yelled, "I've got to go find Jackie!"

* * *

As Jackie had thought, the pool was still drained. She had been enjoying herself for the past forty-five minutes, although the multitude of people pointing and whispering at her was starting to get annoying. She was distracted from this when she saw a blue and blond streak heading right for the empty pool. Quickly realizing who was running so fast, Jackie jumped out of the pool and asked, "Hey Star, where's the fire?"

The princess from another dimension stopped and bent over as she tried to regain her breath. "Marco….you…hoodie…Bro Code." Star managed to wheeze out. Luckily Jackie heard enough to make out what was said and replied, "But that doesn't make any sense, me and Marco aren't…" Jackie managed to catch a glimpse of her shoulder as she shrugged and finally realized she was wearing Marco's hoodie, "dating. Oh no," a look of horror crossed the skater's face, "Star where was Marco running to when you saw him last?" Jackie demanded.

By now Star had regained her breath and said, "I think he was going towards the football field."

"Alright, come on, we have to stop this before things get too serious." Jackie began to skate away, not hearing Star sarcastically say, "Yay, more running."

* * *

Marco was hoping he could avoid the mob until the first class where he would have a small break from the madness and could plan what to do. He decided to go to the football field as it was a mostly open space so the mob couldn't set up an ambush. The plan worked, he was able to keep most of the mob behind him on the field and if some of the faster teens were about to catch him he could maneuver around the bleachers or gym and lose them.

Unfortunately the members of the mob were starting to get smarter. About half broke off from the main mob and waited until he tried running under the bleachers again, then closed off his exit. With his strategy failing, Marco was now trapped and, seeing no other option, settled into his karate stance. As he was mentally preparing himself, Justin stepped forward saying, "You know why we are all here, now do you have any think to say before we begin Marco?"

Marco was about to say something sarcastic until he spotted a small bit of yellow cloth moving. Pointing outward he cried, "Look, one of the cheerleaders is practicing her booty shaking."

About half of the group turned around, more looked ready to do so as well until someone toward the back called out, "Forget about it, it's just Chantelle." Immediately the entire mob's attention was back on Marco, who thought to himself, 'Well looks like this is how it ends, getting beat up over a girl I'm not even going out with. I guess there are worse ways.'

As Marco was getting ready to accept his fate, everyone stopped when Jackie skated in asking, "What is going on here?"

Justin seemed to be the leader of the mob as he said, "We're having a Bro Code with Marco over you."

Jackie sighed as she said, "Look I'll admit that Marco is a good guy and will probably make some girl very happy," the mob looked ready to pounce, "but we aren't dating." Someone from the back of the group yelled out, "But you're wearing his hoodie!" Jackie face palmed as she said, "That doesn't mean we're dating, we just ran into each other and he noticed I was cold and was nice enough to loan it." That seemed to do the trick as the mob lost its blood lust and started to disperse. By the time Star arrived it was only Marco and Jackie left. "Sorry about that Marco, I didn't even realize I was wearing your jacket." Jackie said as she took off the hoodie and gave it back to the boy.

"No problem Jackie, just glad you go here in time. The last Bro Code I saw was pretty brutal."

"I know, wasn't that guy in the hospital for three weeks?"

The two teens were silent after that, both looking toward the ground. The bell was going to ring soon, but Jackie spoke up first saying, "Hey, how about I take you to go see a movie after school, AS FRIENDS," she yelled out before the mob could complete reform, "to apologize for all of this and as a thank you for last Saturday."

Marco smiled at the offer while he said, "As much fun as that sounds I have a karate thing later, I'm only here to turn in the forms allowing me to leave early and get the work that I'd miss."

Before Jackie could reply, the bell rang, "Well later you two, I've got chemistry, don't want to be late for blowing up the classroom."

Star and Jackie waved goodbye and started walking over to the gym, both sharing the first period class. "Well that certainly escalated quickly." Star said.

"I know, all over a simple kind gesture." Jackie then paused as she looked at Star and asked, "Hey Star, do you have any idea why Marco stopped skating?"

"No clue," Star answered, not even bothered by the fact Jackie knew some of Marco's past, "I tried to ask him on Saturday and he gave me a DVD to look at. He warned me not to let Mr. or Mrs. Diaz see me watching it so I didn't get a chance to see it over the weekend, everyone gets so on edge whenever skateboarding is mentioned."

This did cause Jackie some concern. She couldn't say she knew the Diaz family personally, but everyone in Echo Creek knew how happy and carefree the two adults were. "If it's not too much trouble could I come over and watch?"

Star smiled widely as she said, "No problem Jackie, the more the merrier." 'Plus now I can see if there is a possibility of you falling for my friend.'

* * *

The Diaz Residents – That Afternoon

After walking home with Jackie after school, Star ran up to her room to grab the DVD while Jackie looked around the living room. "Wow," Jackie said to herself as she looked at all the photos above the staircase, "the Diaz's have had a lot of exchange students."

"Yep they sure have," Star said as she appeared out of nowhere, "I think Mr. and Mrs. Diaz were trying to get Marco to make more friends." Holding up the blank case, Star said, "Now let's watch this thing."

The girls sat on the couch as the DVD tray retracted back into the machine. For a moment the TV's screen was blue, before it was quickly replaced by a young Marco, perhaps four years old, sitting on a bike with training wheels. "Ah, little Marco, so cute." Star said, with Jackie silently agreeing.

"And here we have Marco with his first bike." Mr. Diaz narrated off screen. Marco began to peddle away, only for another voice to get his attention. "Wait Marco, you need to wear your helmet," a younger Mrs. Diaz appeared on screen, kneeling down as she put a black helmet on Marco. "There, safety first."

The next few minutes were of Mr. and Mrs. Diaz walking behind Marco as he peddled around the neighborhood, until Marco stopped and stared at a few older kids on skateboards trying to do some simple tricks. Seeing where her son's attention was, Mrs. Diaz said, "Oh Marco, you're much too small for a skate board, maybe in a couple years."

The film then cut to a camping trip, then sped through some holidays and Marco's fifth birthday, until it was once more focused on Marco sitting on a bike, this one lacking training wheels. "Okay," Mr. Diaz once more narrated, "this is Marco's first time without training wheels. Are you ready son?"

"Ready Dad."

"Marco," Mrs. Diaz called from off screen, "have you seen your helmet, I can't find it anywhere."

"I'm wearing it, safety first." Marco called back.

"Okay then," Mr. Diaz then passed the camera to his wife as he stood behind his son's bike and held it upright by the seat. "Start peddling Marco."

Marco immediately speed off so quickly that Mr. Diaz could not keep his grip on the bike. Marco never stopped, just kept going down the street as his parents raced after their son. "If he's this fast right now, I'm going to be worried when he starts to drive." Mr. Diaz said.

"He gets his adrenaline junkie tendencies from your side of the family." was Mrs. Diaz's reply, causing both girls to laugh.

The video then jumped to Marco's sixth birthday right as Marco blew out the candles. "Happy Birthday Marco." Mr. and Mrs. Diaz said as one.

"We didn't get you much this year," Mr. Diaz began, "But we hope you enjoy what we did get you." Mrs. Diaz finished as Marco unwrapped an oddly shaped present, revealing a skateboard and a set a knee and elbow pads. Marco smiled at the camera as he said, "It's fine Mom and Dad, it's just what I wanted."

Almost all of the video following this point was of Marco skating around, first just getting use moving on the board, next doing a few ollies and manuals. As the video continued, both girls saw Marco doing more and more complicated tricks as he grew older, either at a skate park or on a homebuilt ramp. They also noticed that the knee and elbow pads began to be absent, even after Marco was show sporting a cast around his arm in one short segment, but a helmet was always present.

The last part of the video showed Mr. and Mrs. Diaz sitting in the front of the car with an approximately ten-year-old Marco sitting in the back seat. "Here is the Diaz family on our way to the beach. What are you going to do when we get there Marco?" Mrs. Diaz asked.

Marco smiled as he said, "I heard that there's a brand new skate park with a jump over the canal."

The girls could see the look of concern on Mrs. Diaz's face, apparently so did the younger Marco as he said, "Relax mom, they don't let you do the jump unless your fourteen."

Star paused the video and asked Jackie, "Have you ever heard of this skate park?"

"I think so," Jackie said, "it's a few counties south of here, makes sense as there is a larger beach there and attracts more tourists."

"So do you think Marco tried the jump anyway?" Star asked.

Jackie shook her head and said, "Even if he was younger, Marco still looks like a person who would do what he was told. Let's watch the rest of this, no telling when the Diaz's will be home and we probably don't want to be caught watching this."

Unpausing the video, the girls saw a look a relief on Mrs. Diaz's face. "Okay Marco, just remember to have fun, and safety first."

The video then showed the Diaz's day at the beach, the family sunbathing, enjoying the water, eating at a local restaurant, and Marco grinding on a few benches along a path, helmet still present. The last part of the video was Mr. Diaz filming Mrs. Diaz as she walked in the water alongside the setting sun. "Here she is, my Calypso, with a song that rivals the sirens, and beauty that could make Aphrodite jealous."

"Oh stop you." Mrs. Diaz gave her husband a slight shove while she blushed. "It's getting late, we should probably head home. Now where did Marco go?"

"I think he said something about going to the Boardwalk."

The girls saw Mrs. Diaz go deathly pale as she asked, "Do you mean that Boardwalk?"

When Mr. Diaz turned around, the girls saw that someone was grinding along the railing of part of the Boardwalk that was at least 20 feet high and jutting out into the ocean. They could tell that it was Marco based on the black, grey, and red swim trunks, and even with the distance could see that he was not wearing a helmet. However, what truly scared them was when a security guard ran up and tried to grab Marco off his board, only to send the boy and the board in the opposite direction, causing Marco to hit his head on the railing.

As soon as Marco began falling, the camera showed Mr. Diaz's feet and was very shaky, indicating the man was running. Already the girls could hear cries of "Marco" coming from both parents. This lasted for perhaps ten to fifteen minutes until they heard Mrs. Diaz cry, "There he is!"

When the camera was slightly more stable, the girls saw that Marco had somehow washed up in a small cove, away from the main beach. Miraculously, the boy's breathing was normal and his board was nearby, although he was bleeding slightly from his head. "Oh my boy, thank God you are all right." Mrs. Diaz kept saying. After Mr. Diaz said he was going to go get some help, the video stopped.

"Wow," Jackie said, "that's certainly a lot to take in."

"I know," Star replied, "but I can't help but feel we're missing something. Could you replay that last part?"

"Sure." Jackie said as she pushed the rewind button. Suddenly Star said for her to stop, "Look," the girl got off the couch and pointed to the sand next to the unconscious Marco, bring attention to a small trench leading into the ocean, "Marco didn't just wash up in that cove, someone dragged him there."

"But then where did they go?" Jackie asked.

Star was silent for a moment before saying, "Is there anyway for you to play this slower?"

"Sure, but I don't see how that would help."

Playing the video frame by frame, Jackie wondered what Star was think. Star however wasn't looking at the ground, instead she was looking out into the water until she yelled "Stop!" Jackie was startled but immediately did as she was told. "Now play those last two frames and look here." Not seeing the point, Jackie none the less followed orders. Looking at the area Star said to pay attention to, Jackie saw a quick flash of blue, darker than the water surrounding it. The flash lasted no more than a frame, you wouldn't be able to see it if you didn't know where to look. Seeing Star smile, Jackie said, "I take it you figure something out, mind sharing?"

"I will Jackie, but do you mind if I talk to Marco first? I need to make sure of a few things."

Jackie shrugged her shoulder as she looked at the clock, noticing it was almost eight. "Sure, no problem. I need to get home anyway, it's almost time for dinner and my aunt will kill me if I'm late."

"You don't live with your parents?" Star asked.

Jackie looked slightly angry as she said, "Me and my parents don't exactly get along so I live here with my aunt and cousin. But enough about that, just let me know when you figured out what happened. Later Star."

* * *

As Jackie left, Star quickly turned off the DVD play, turned off the TV, and put the DVD away, just in time as Marco and Mr. and Mrs. Diaz walked in. "Hi everyone, how was the karate thing?"

"It was good," Marco said, "I ended up being asked to do some demonstrations and impressed my sensei and a few other people enough to be promoted to a blue belt." Marco smiled as he held up his new belt."

"I think to celebrate, tonight we go out for dinner!" Mr. Diaz announced. "We'll leave as soon as Marco changes, in the meantime the Mrs. and I need to water the plants in the back yard."

After his parent went outside, Star grabbed Marco's arm before he could go upstairs. "I watched the video."

"So you know what happened."

"The question do you?" Seeing Marco's confused look, Star said, "We can talk about it tomorrow."

"Don't we have school?"

"Nope, the mystery meat came to life due to a science experiment done by the science club. Ended up destroying the cafeteria, school's cancelled for at least a day, possible two."

Marco nodded his head, wondering what his friend knew that he didn't.

* * *

Jackie was skateboarding home, a million and three things on her mind, but one though kept resurfacing, 'It's him, Marco is him.' She really couldn't believe the odds of such a thing happening, now she just hoped she could explain everything without scaring the boy too badly. He did fight monsters on an almost weekly basis, he should be fine, right?

* * *

 **And that's chapter 2 of** _ **The Runaway**_ **, bit longer at 12 pages than the previous chapter isn't it?**

 **Now we're getting into the meat of the story, as I said it'd be a short four chapter tale, but I hope that everyone reading will still enjoy it. So, now we know why Marco has skating skills, and why know that Jackie has been searching for him, yet we still don't know…**

 **Why is Jackie searching for Marco?**

 **What does Star know?**

 **What could Jackie need to explain that could scare Marco off? (I've hinted at this a lot in this chapter, but please no spoilers in the reviews.)**

 **These questions and more will, hopefully, be explained in the coming chapter of** _ **The Runaway**_ **, and remember if you enjoyed what you read, consider leaving a review or you could follow/favorite this story. I'll try to write some more this week, but the next update probably won't be until the middle of next week, however I can't promise anything.**

 **With all that said, here's acw28 saying, "until next update."**


	3. A Gym, a Truth Revealed, and a Goodbye

**Updated 8/3/15: fixed a few misspellings.**

 **Hello everyone, it's acw28 with chapter 3 of** _ **The Runaway**_ **!**

 **For once I really don't have anything to say/rant about, so I guess this is going to be a short author's note. All I really have to say is that based on what's in my head, this will probably be a short chapter, but as I said in the last chapter, I will try to have at least three pages before I post anything. Just a bit of warning, this chapter is going to have some light cursing. Also, thanks to everyone who has contributed to this story reaching over 600 views in less than two weeks.**

 **One last thing before we start this chapter, be on the look out for a special announcement next chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own** _ **Star vs. the Forces of Evil**_ **, a company lead by a mouse uses it to gain profit.**

* * *

"Bye kids!" Mr. Diaz called from the car. "Have fun with you "Monster Day" while me and Marco's father are at work." Mrs. Diaz finished for her husband.

"Bye Mr. and Mrs. Diaz!" Star yelled as she furiously waved at the couple. Marco said a more subdued, "Bye Mom, bye Dad." as he gave a small wave goodbye. Once the car was out of sight, Marco asked, "How did the Science Club manage to bring the mystery meat to life anyway, I thought they were one of the most underfunded school activities."

"Oh they wanted to know how I could make things appear with my wand." Star began as the two walked inside. "I tried telling them it was just magic, but they insisted my wand was some sort of matter converter or something like that. Anyway they kept bugging me all day and I ended up agreeing to some test to prove them wrong during lunch."

Marco gave Star a deadpanned look before he continued walking toward her room to hang out for the day, then said, "And I'm guessing you said a spell wrong and accidently caused the lunch meat to become sentient."

"No, actually I meant to do that."

The room was silent for a moment until Marco said, "I don't know which of those scenarios is scarier. Oh well at least you're getting a better handle on your wand." Sliding onto the rolling chair, Marco said, "Well we got the day free, so what do you want to do? Get Ferguson and Alfonzo over here for a surprise pranks war, go to another dimension, or do you want do something normal like go hang out at the mall all day?"

Star belly flopped onto her bed as she said, "You know what I want to do."

Marco sighed as he asked, "Do we have to?"

Star rolled onto her back as she said, "I told you yesterday Diaz that we were going to talk about this, so spill. What happened that day you went to the beach?"

"You saw the video, you know what happened."

"No," Star began, her voice lacking her usual cheerfulness and carrying a small amount of authority, "I saw what your parents saw, but I don't know what made you decided to grind the boardwalk and why you didn't have a helmet or what happened after you fell into the water."

The room was silent for a minute as both teens stared each other in the eye, neither wanting to back down from the unspoken challenge. Finally it was Marco who sighed and looked away. Closing his eyes as he recalled the long buried memory he began, "It was a little after lunch, I hadn't gotten to check out the skate park yet so I asked Mom and Dad if I could. My Mom wanted to enjoy the beach a little more and didn't want to leave me alone, but my Dad told her it would be a crowded area and if someone were to try something I would yell my head off. Surprisingly that worked, and my Mom let me go off after she got some footage of me skateboarding. Since it took my Dad's convincing my Mom to let me go off, he probably blames himself for what happened."

"What did happen Marco?"

"I'm getting to that, but if I just tell you it wouldn't make sense, you need the back story. Anyway," Marco continued his tale as he leaned back in the chair, staring at the ceiling, "I got to the skate park a few minutes later and enjoyed myself. Did a few grinds, did a few grabs, a few 180's. I think there may have been a couple of people recording me, all in all, a good time. Then I saw some of the older kids picking on some younger kids."

"Oh, oh, oh, let me guess!" Star yelled as she jumped on her bed. "You tried fighting the bullies but they called in this super tall meanie and you had to skate away."

"What?" Marco asked as he laughed. "No, nothing like that. I was still only a brown belt so I knew I probably couldn't fight them, so I asked them to stop and when they wouldn't I challenged them to a game of Simon Says. I did pretty well, knocked out three of the four bullies but then the last one did a trick over the canal."

"Right, wasn't there something about you needed to be 14 to do that jump?" Star asked.

"Yeah, so obviously I couldn't do it and asked for an alternate option. Of course, the jerk said I needed to jump or I forfeited like a chicken. I got angry and said that he took a cheap shot because he knew I could beat him if he played fair."

"So then he started chasing you around and you went to the board walk, right?"

"Stop interrupting Star, I thought you wanted to hear this story." Marco jokingly lectured his friend. "Of course the guy wasn't happy, but by now a crowd had gathered and had watched the entire thing, so he really didn't have much of a choice. In place of the jump, he said I had to grind the rails at the boardwalk for at least 30 seconds."

As he reached the last part of his story, Marco got up and started pacing around the room. "When I got over there, I noticed that there were signs saying, "NO SKATEBOARDING" and there was a security guard that was watching anyone with a helmet. Then I noticed there were a multitude of people without helmets just carrying their boards around. So I had one of the kids hold onto my helmet as I walked to the far side of the boardwalk. I tried to make sure I was far away from the security guards, put my board down, got some speed, and started grinding. I don't know how long I lasted, but I saw a guard running toward me. I saw he tried to grab me off my board, and not thinking I leaned away from him. You know the rest."

Marco then lifted some of his hair along the right side of his head, showing Star part of a large scar. "It took about 58 stiches to put my head back together, not to mention I was in a coma for three days."

Star was stunned into silence, but managed to ask, "So the reason your parents don't want you skateboarding…"

"Is because they're afraid something like that will happen again." Marco finished for her. "Should have been there when I first got up, after making sure everything was okay, my Dad, while not exactly yelling, made it very clear that I was never to touch a skateboard in my life. He took my board and helmet and locked them up in the shed. Doesn't really matter, after what happened I get motion sickness if I ride in anything besides the car or school bus."

Star was silent as she hugged her pillow until she finally asked, "Is that all that happened Marco?"

"Of course it is, I was knocked out for a large portion of it, remember?"

"Marco," Star began, "if there's something else, no matter how crazy it sounds, you can tell me."

Marco sighed for the millionth time that day. Could he tell Star? Through all the years he had kept one detail to himself, he knew if he shared it he'd be called crazy or they would say he imagined it when he hit his head. But Star was from another dimension and he had been fighting monster's with her on a weekly basis. Not seeing what else he had to lose, Marco said, "I don't know if it was when I was in the water or if it was in the cove, but I remember a girl looking worried about me. I can't exactly remember what she looked like, only that I thought she looked beautiful." Marco admitted with a blush.

When she heard this, Star suddenly jumped to her feet and pointed at Marco while she yelled, "I knew it!"

Marco was confused, but only more so when Star started pushing him out of her room. "Knew what, and why are you trying to get me out of your room?"

"Just an idea I had after watching the video yesterday, and I'm pushing you out of my room because I need to practice a special spell."

Marco recognized the twinkle in Star's eyes and told her, "Not everything has some interdimensional solution you know." Star waved off his words as she said, "Haven't you spent enough time with me by now to know that's not true?" Before she pushed him out of her room and shut the door, only to reopen it a second later to say, "And be ready for a trip to another dimension after your parents go to work tomorrow."

Marco only shook his head as he walked back to his room. Walking into his room and laying on his bed, the boy began to debate what to do with his day. He could go online and crush some beginners along with Fergusson and Alfonzo, but then he'd just be sitting in his room all day and he'd rather do something productive. With that in mind, Marco grabbed a duffel bag and some spare cloths, then called to Star as he walked out of the house, "I'm going to the gym, be back in a while. If Ludo comes I've got my phone."

* * *

It was about an hour long walk from the Diaz home to the local gym. Marco expected an uneventful day as he walked past a small hill, but was proven wrong when a voice called out, "Heads up!"

It was only due to Marco's fast reflexes that he was able to drop to the ground as somebody sailed overhead. Getting up, Marco saw that Jackie had jumped over him. "Wow, that's two times in the same week that you've run into me. Are you stalking me?"

"Please," Jackie began, "I spend too much time skateboarding and struggling to stay awake in Skullnick's class to even think about stalking someone. Besides," the girl continued, "between the two of us I'm the one more likely to be stalked."

"Oh really?" Marco challenged.

"Duh," Jackie said, "I'm a single skateboarding chick who can pull off bad ass moves. I wouldn't be surprised if I did have a stalker."

"I'll give you that, but I do live in the same house as an interdimensional princess whose enemies might try to use our friendship against her." Marco countered, amazed at how easy conversation between the two had become recently.

Jackie huffed as she crossed her arms and said, "Fine I guess we'll call it even, what's with the duffel bag?"

"I figured since school is cancelled I might as well do something productive and decided to go to the gym."

"This town has a gym?"

"How could you not know that, you've been living here since when, Seventh Grade so three years?"

Jackie shrugged as she answered, "Besides school and skating I didn't really see anything interesting in this town. So where is this gym anyway?"

"Not too far from here actually. Come on, I'll show you the way."

"Sure, let's just swing by my house real quick so I can stash my board."

Marco raised an eyebrow as he asked, "You're going right now, with me?"

"Sure why not, I don't see the point in going to a gym and not working out."

* * *

It was a short walk to Jackie's house. When the two teens arrived Marco was surprised to see Janna open the door. Before he could say anything, Janna saw him and said, "Oh, I see how it is Marco, you don't want to make magic with me but when Jackie asks you follow her home."

This caused both teens to blush, Marco was the first to find his voice and said, "It's not like that Janna. Why are you in Jackie's house anyway?"

Janna leaned against the doorframe as she said, "I live here genius."

Seeing the look of confusion on Marco's face, Jackie spoke up saying, "Janna's my annoying cousin who is constantly playing pranks on me. In fact I'm sure she had a hand in the Bro Code yesterday." Janna only looked at the two and smiled. "Anyway just ignore her, it's what I do most of the time. I'll just grab my stuff real quick and we can go."

Once Jackie was inside, Janna turned to Marco and gave him a knowing look. Getting annoyed, the boy asked "What?"

"I'm surprised, most guys tend to not date a girl when they know that it'll lead to a blood thirsty mob chasing after them."

"Jackie and I aren't dating, I'm just showing her where the gym is at."

Janna only shook her head as she said, "Keep telling yourself that Diaz, see where that'll take you." As the girl went back into the house, Jackie stepped out, carrying her own duffel bag. "Okay, all set. So where's this gym?"

Marco smiled as he said, "Its right this way."

* * *

The two teens where walking for perhaps fifteen minutes while making small talk when an annoying voice said, "Hey Diaz, shouldn't you be in school?" Said voice belonged to a seven year old buck toothed boy wearing a blue shirt with a white sweater tied around his neck. Marco groaned as he said, "It go cancelled today Jeremy, shouldn't you be in class or did your parent's bribe the principle, again?"

"If you have the money, why not use it?" Jeremy then noticed Jackie for the first time and asked, "What is someone like you doing with a loser like Marco?"

Marco was getting irritated as he stated, "You can't just leave me alone for one day, can you, you little troll."

Jeremy only laughed as he said, "What's the matter Marco, upset when someone says the truth?" Having enough of the twerp, Marco reached into his duffel bag for his secret weapon.

Meanwhile Jackie was also becoming irritated by Jeremy's comments. The brat seem to know what Marco was capable of, yet still continued to mouth off. 'Does he even realize the difference between him and Marco?' She wondered. 'If it was any other fourteen year old, the brat would be flattened by now.' As Jeremy continued speaking, Jackie debated doing something drastic just to shut the kid up. 'I could kiss Marco, but that would just make things awkward. I could use _that_ , but then I would have to do a lot of explaining.' When Jeremy made his last comment, Jackie was about to go through with her plan, when Marco threw a small, sticky toy octopus onto the younger boy's head and said, "Look out Jeremy, they want to eat your bowels!"

The reaction was immediate, Jeremy began running away while screaming. Marco was bent over from laughing so hard, while Jackie was chuckling as well. When he recovered and started walking toward the gym again, Marco turned to Jackie and said, "Yeah I know, totally immature and childish, but in my defense we would have been here forever if I just let him keep talking."

"It's no problem, I probably would have thought of a way to get him to leave in a few minutes anyway."

"Really, any ideas?"

"Oh I don't know." Jackie said, then added in a slightly flirty voice, "He didn't think you could go out with a girl like me so I might have kissed you just to send him into shock."

When Marco heard this he blushed then wished he had waited with the toy octopus. Before any more could be said, the two teens arrived at the gym.

* * *

'Come on, what is taking her so long?' Marco mentally questioned. The two had arrived at the gym about 15 minutes ago. Getting checked in and changing had taken the boy around five minutes. Currently he was waiting by the water fountains as he promised he would show the girl around. 'Why do I have to be such a nice guy all the time?'

"Hey, sorry that took a while. Hope you weren't waiting long."

Marco turned around and had to fight to keep his jaw off the ground. For her first trip to the gym, Jackie had chosen to wear a dark green sports bra, which showed off her toned stomach, and a pair of white and green shorts that made her legs seem to go on forever. After seeing this, the only thought in Marco's head was, 'Good things come to those who wait.' When he was able to speak Marco said, "It wasn't too long, so what do you want to do first?"

Jackie crossed one arm under her chest while she grabbed her elbow with one hand and tapped the other one against her chin. This simple act, either purposely or inadvertently, caused her chest to look bigger and also gave Marco the perfect view. After remaining like this a few short moments, Jackie said, "Well I've never been here before, so I'll just follow your lead."

Marco shrugged as he said, "Alright then, follow me, the yoga class should be beginning soon."

As the two walked towards the yoga room, Jackie took note of what Marco was wearing. The simple red tank top left his arms on display, which although they weren't overly muscular were quite large, while the black basket ball shorts showed Marco's muscular calves. "You know if you wore short sleeves more often you'd probably be a bit more popular."

"Yeah, but then the question becomes do I want popularity if it means I have to hang out with Brittany."

Jackie nodded her head as she said, "You make a good point. I don't think anyone is actually friends with that girl, more so just afraid of her ruining their life."

Marco raised an eyebrow as he asked, "Then how come you were at her last party?"

"Again, she could just about ruin anyone's life, and I might have been hoping to meet someone there," Marco felt his self-confidence, and his chances of asking out his crush, lessen, "besides how are you one to talk, you went to the party to."

"Okay I was only at the party because Star convinced me to crash it, I didn't have any fun anyway since I ended up getting motion sickness." By now both teens had arrived at the yoga studio. "Remember, if you feel a pose is too difficult, just sit down and relax." Marco then held the door open as he said, "After you."

* * *

45 minutes later

"Wow, I'm impressed." Jackie said as the two teens exited out of the yoga studio along with a multitude of other people. "I would think that most guys would only come to yoga to look at the woman in all the different poses, but you actually knew what you were doing."

"It's a good way to stretch before a workout and it helps keep me flexible for karate." Looking at the clock, Marco said, "I've still got awhile before my parents get home, what else you want to do?"

Jackie pointed over her shoulder as she said, "Looks like two treadmills opened up. You up for it?"

Marco smirked as he replied, "I can, question is can you keep up?"

The two started the treadmills at a moderate pace to warm up. After a few moments of silence, Jackie asked, "So what was with the brat, the toy octopus, and his bowels?"

Marco chuckled slightly as he asked, "Remember when I had that tentacle arm awhile back?" Jackie nodded. "I ended up convincing Star to let me keep it until my karate tournament against Jeremy. Only problem is that it turned out to have a mind of its own and was evil. I defeated Jeremy, but then my arm wanted to eat his bowels."

"Whoa, that's pretty heavy, good thing the arm is gone." Marco smiled nervously and decided not to mention how the arm compared itself to a virus and claimed it would be back.

After a while, Marco noticed it was starting to get late. "Looks like we have enough time to do one more thing. How about a little competition?"

Jackie smirked as she asked, "What do you have in mind?"

"How about fifteen more minutes of running, whoever runs farther chooses how we spend our last 45 minutes here."

"Sounds like you have a bet. I hope you're ready to lose." Jackie declared.

* * *

15 minutes later

As both Marco and Jackie were slowing down, Marco asked, "So how far did you run?"

Jackie smiled, believing she'd won, when she proudly said, "10 miles."

"Pretty good, but I think I have you beat." Marco stepped aside so that Jackie could see how far he ran. The girl only stared in disbelief.

"How did you manage to run 15 miles?"

"Well I do regularly fight monsters, so I need a fair amount of endurance." Marco smirked in victory as he said, "All I really did was set the speed about .05 mph faster than what you had yours on."

"Well played Diaz, well played." Jackie said with a small pout. "Well you won, so what do you want to do?"

There was a glint in Marco's eye as he said, "Come on I'll show you."

* * *

After putting on getting a set of MMA gloves, Marco started practicing some basic punch combinations on a heavy bag, with a reluctant Jackie barely able to keep the bag somewhat centered. Once the boy stopped to take a break, Jackie asked, "How can you be this strong. I mean I know you take karate and fight monsters, but come on! I'm barely able to stand after you hit this thing!"

As he was grabbing his water, Marco said, "Physical strength and training are factors, but it's also about technique." Seeing Jackie raise her eyebrow, Marco began taking off his gloves as he said, "Here, I'll show you."

After Jackie had put the gloves on, Marco had her punch the bag, which barely moved. Jackie noticed Marco trying to hold in his laughter and glared at him. "Shut up, not all of us make a hobby of fighting monsters."

"Sorry, but it's obvious you've never been in a real fight before, you're only using your arm."

"What do you mean Marco?"

"If you want to punch harder, you need to put your weight behind it."

Jackie's eyes narrowed as she said, "Here's a little tip for you Marco, you should never call a woman fat."

Waving his hands in front of himself, and hoping to avoid womanly rage, Marco quickly said, "I never said you were, just that you don't have a technique."

"Okay then, tell me how to do this."

"Fine, first start with a solid base with you feet, now move your weight forward, then bring all that force into your fist." When he saw he was getting a confused look from his crush, Marco said, "Here, let me help you."

Stepping behind Jackie, Marco used his own feet to help adjust her stance, putting her right foot behind her and angling her body. Next he grabbed her right writs and brought he arm up and back so that it bent at the elbow. Finally he had her quickly step forward, bring the right side of her body forward, and guided her fist to the heavy bag. Although it wasn't sent as far back as one of Marco's punches, it was still a marked improvement over her first attempt. The girl looked at her fist and said, "Whoa."

"Right, so just do something similar for the left side right after and you'll be in business." Marco said as he got behind the heavy bag. "Now why don't you try it by yourself this time?"

* * *

After getting a quick shower, Marco and Jackie started heading home, the sky already dark. After walking in a comfortable silence for around five minutes, Jackie's house came into view. Turning to Marco, the girl said, "Well that was fun, we should do it again sometime."

"Sure, next time Star causes the school lunch to go on a rampage we can just go hide out at the gym, see ya Jackie."

"Night Marco."

Marco watched as Jackie walked up to the door and went inside before he continued towards his own house. What he didn't see was Jackie lean against the door and release a content sigh. 'That was actually fun, would have been better if he…' she stopped herself form continuing that thought. 'I have to tell him now, after having such a good time, that secret will just ruin everything.'

Hoping to get her mind off of her troubles, Jackie decided to check out what her friends had recently been posting, not having checked her phone while she was at the gym. 'Weird,' she thought, 'why do I have so many notifications?'

* * *

Marco arrived home not long afterwards, walking in right before dinner. "Well I can tell someone had a good day." Mrs. Diaz said.

"Just glad there wasn't any craziness today. I managed to run into a friend and we ended up going to the gym."

"Yep, you definitely ran into a _very good friend_ didn't you Marco?" Star asked, a large smile present on her face. Marco didn't get what the princess was saying, but figured she would share after dinner.

Since it was the parents' turn to do the dishes, Star literally dragged Marco into her room. Before Marco could ask what she was doing, Star had quickly turned on her computer and had pulled up her profile, after scrolling down, she turned around to show Marco what had her in such a good mood. On the monitor was a picture of him and Jackie at the gym, taken when he was teaching her how to punch. Marco quickly noted that it was Janna who posted the photo, and added a caption reading, "Are we sure these two aren't secret lovebirds?" A quick scroll through the comments revealed a mix of reactions, from some saying they looked cute together to others mentioning plans for another Bro Code.

'Yep, I'm dead.' Marco thought. 'I wonder how Jackie is handling this.'

* * *

Janna was currently hoping the lock on her door would hold out against Jackie's rage. Every time the door bowed inward, the teen was able to hear snippets of the other girl's threats.

"Unlock this damn door so I can fucking kill you!" Jackie yelled.

"If you do that my mom will ground you." Janna replied as she hid, er, took a strategic position under her bed. Soon after the house grew quite, Janna poked her head out from her bed, thinking that Jackie went to go grab something to bust down her door.

'Okay, I can use this brief pause to escape out of my window.'

That plan fell apart as Janna heard a sharp crack. Looking to her door, Janna was horrified when she saw a fist burst through the wood right next to the handle, then quickly unlocked her door. The door slowly creaked open to reveal Jackie. "I don't mind when you play your little pranks on me, but when you start causing other people to get hurt than we have a problem." Jackie paused as she punched her palm, "Now, want to learn what Marco taught me today?" she asked with a predator gleam in her eyes.

Janna had two options, stay and take a beating she probably deserved, or make a brake for her open window. Knowing which had a lesser chance of causing her injury, Janna yelled, "I regret nothing!" as she jumped out the two story window.

* * *

"Well guess I'm not going to school for a couple more days." Marco stated, not wanting another Bro Code, he'd just wait for some new gossip to occupy everyone's attention. Turning to the still smirking Star, he asked, "Now will you please tell me why you kicked me out of your room today?"

"Okay Marco. Now, what would you say if," Star paused for dramatic effect, "you really did see a girl the day of your incident?"

"Star don't be crazy," Marco waved off his friends words, "I hit my head pretty hard, I just imagined her. If she was real I think I'd remember her face."

"Unless she didn't want you to remember." Star stated.

Marco raised an eyebrow and dropped his jaw as he asked, "Say what?"

"Don't worry about it Marco, all will be explained tomorrow." Star declared as she moved her hands in a circular motion, trying to add a flair of mystery. Marco only rolled his eyes as he went to his room.

* * *

Mr. and Mrs. Diaz left early the next morning as they had a conference a few counties over that would last that day and the majority of the next. Once they were home alone, Marco stated, "Okay, the suspense is killing me. Just tell me already."

"Simple Marco." Star put on a pair of sunglasses, "What you saw that day," she then paused to dramatically take off her sunglasses, "was a mermaid!"

Star expected a multitude of reactions from Marco, ranging from crying to acceptance. She did not expect him to double over as he busted out laughing. Once he could control himself, Marco said, "Sorry Star, but mermaids are just myths."

"I'm serious Marco." Star declared as she put her hands on her hips and tapped her foot. "You fight monsters with me all the time, is the existence of mermaids that farfetched?"

"Yes," Marco deadpanned, "the monsters I fight never appeared in any myths before, but mermaids have been mentioned as far back as ancient Greece."

Star let out a growl as she chewed on her wand to stop herself from screaming at Marco's stubbornness. Once she composed herself, she said, "Look Marco, there are multiple underwater dimensions that have mermaid-like life, and I know of one that regularly has portals randomly open." Star then grew serious as she said, "Now do you want to continue believing that you didn't see anything or do you want to take a chance and see if this girl is real?"

The house was silent for what seemed like an eternity. Finally Marco said, "Well you did spend all of yesterday working on that spell, and I've really got nothing left to lose."

Star started jumping up and down as she clapped her hands. Grabbing Marco, she pointed her wand at herself and him as she said, "Dimensional protection bubble!" There was a bright flash, but afterwards Marco didn't notice anything different. Voicing his question, the boy asked, "Star what did you do?"

"Nothing much, just a protection spell so we won't get wet and so we can breath in the other dimension." She then used a pair of red handled scissors to open a portal, grabbed Marco, and jumped in.

* * *

The two teens were dumped in a dimension that, as Star claimed, was completely underwater. The buildings seemed to be made of a mix of coral and bricks, some were rounder while some were square. He also noted there were no stairs as everyone swam everywhere. Off in the distance Marco could see what looked like a canyon, in which he saw a portal randomly open and close. While all this was amazing, what truly captured Marco's attention were the people.

The town they arrived in was filled with various people. There were the standard mermaids and mermen, each with a brightly colored fishtail, the mermaids having long hair while the mermen kept theirs' short. The mermaids also wore the typical seashell bra, which caused Marco to blush endlessly. The other inhabitants could only be described as human like sharks of various species. While these people had arms and legs and lacked tails, their entire bodies were streamlined, their mouths full of sharp teeth, and three gills present on each cheek.

"Well come on Marco, let's look around and see if anyone jogs your memory."

Marco only nodded, realizing that Star was right. He had never imagined a girl who he met on the worse day of his life, whose face he couldn't remember, actually existed, and was from another dimension. What was it about his life that invited such strange things?

* * *

It was well past lunch. Marco and Star had walked/swam around the entire town and while the duo where subjects of many odd looks, nobody seemed to jog Marco's memory.

"Come on Star," Marco began, "maybe you were right about the whole mermaid thing but she obviously isn't here."

"Wait Marco, we still have one last place to look." Star said as she gestured towards the royal palace. Not seeing anything else to lose, Marco shrugged his shoulder and followed the princess' lead. The two swam a short distance and soon joined a tour group.

"Now on your left is the princess tower. Sadly it has been uninhabited for the past four years after the princess' mysterious disappearance." The tour guide then lead the group into a grand hall, filled with various portraits. Marco tuned out the guide as they went on about one royal ancestor or another. Finally the group came to the largest portrait, "And this is the current royal family, King Mano, Queen Circe, and their missing daughter." Looking at the painting, Marco froze.

The largest person pictured was one of the shark-men, his mouth full of sharp teeth, his back and arms grey while his stomach and chest was white, Marco guessed he would be identified as a Great White. What terrified Marco was the numerous battle scars on the man's body and the predatory look in his eyes. If the King was terrifying, the Queen was equally beautiful, having long, light green hair that matched her tail. The Queen was also well endowed and wore many gold necklaces, bracelets, a gold tiara with numerous diamonds, and her seashell bra looked to have some gold inlay.

While both the King and Queen could hold Marco's attention for different reasons, his eyes settled on the princess. Her hair and her eyes matched her mother's, although she didn't wear any jewelry and what was painted of the tail was a dark blue. Even if she was younger, even with the three gills on each cheek, Marco instantly recognized the face of Jackie Lynn Thomas. He wasn't the only one as he heard Star start to say, "Hey Marco, doesn't she look like…" only to be silenced by Marco's hand over her mouth. However, this small action gained the tour guide's attention.

"Does the young lady have something to say?"

"Nope," Marco answered, his hand still covering Star's mouth, "she just reminded me that we have some things to do at home." Marco quickly used Star's scissors to open a portal before any more questions could be asked.

Seeing such strange behavior, one the castle guards thought, 'I should report this to the King, perhaps they know where the princess is at.'

* * *

Marco didn't take his hand away from Star's mouth until they were back in Star's room. When she was able to speak, Star asked, "Marco, do you know what this means?"

"Yeah," he replied as he sighed, "that Jackie was the one to drag me out of the ocean."

"And she's royalty!" Star yelled. Grabbing Marco's wrist, she started dragging her friend to the door as she said, "Come one, let's go tell her what we found!"

"No, Star wait!" Marco was able to free his arm from Star's grip. "Look, I really appreciate what all you've done, but do you think I could do this by myself?"

Star seemed to deflate slightly, but then quickly recovered with a giant grin as she said, "Okay Marco, I'll let you handle this on your own, on one condition."

Dreading what the interdimensional princess would demand, Marco hesitantly asked, "And what would that be?"

If it were possible, Star's smile grew as she said, "You have to tell Jackie you like her."

* * *

Marco stood in front of Jackie's and Janna's house, unsure if he had the courage to do what he needed to. Taking a deep breath, the boy walked up to the door. As he thought to himself, 'I just need five minutes of unbelievable courage,' he knocked on the door. After a few seconds, it was opened by Janna, now sporting a black eye.

"What happened to you?"

"You taught your girlfriend too well. Is there anything you need?" Janna asked in a tone that made it clear she wasn't in the mood to tease him like she usually does.

Swallowing the lump in his throat, Marco asked, "Is Jackie home?"

In response, Janna moved to the side and said, "She's out back."

When Marco walked out into the back yard, he saw Jackie sitting down on a private beach, looking out into the ocean. Quietly walking behind her, Marco asked, "Is this spot taken?" Jackie jumped slightly, startled, but scooted over some to allow Marco to sit down. Neither knew what to say for a few minutes until Marco asked, "If I were to tell you Star dragged me to a dimension full of mermaids and shark-people, what would you say?"

Jackie was silent for a few moments, long enough for Marco to think that maybe he and Star were wrong and that it was a case of mistaken identity and now Jackie thought he was crazy. Those doubts were shot down when Jackie answered, "I would ask if you saw the royal portrait."

Marco was shocked, true this was the outcome he had expected, but it just didn't seem real. "So, mermaid…" Marco began.

"I know, pretty weird, right?" Jackie asked, still not looking at Marco.

Marco only laughed as he said, "I live with a girl who can make puppies that shoot lasers out of their eyes appear out of thin air, I fight evil monsters almost every other day, my arm was a tentacle briefly, one of my friends almost got married to a pixie, my other friend did get married to a pixie. I don't know about you, but weird seems to be normal to me."

Jackie was silent for a split second before she joined in the laughter. "Yeah, weird things just seem to happen to you."

After the good laugh, Marco grew slightly serious as he asked, "So you were there the day I wiped out?" Jackie answered with a nod of her head, "What all did you see?"

"When I first came to Earth the portal opened in the canal by the skate park. I watched as you first started playing Simon Says," Jackie began, "I saw you wining then I saw the last one pull the cheap trick. I saw your group moving and followed as best I could. Then I saw you fall off the boardwalk." Jackie closed her eyes as she remembered. "I figured you were all right and would start swimming to the surface, but I didn't see you move so I grabbed you and your board, found a cove where no one would see me, and waited until someone found you." She then leaned back, looking at the stars she had never seen in her home dimension. Holding her seashell necklace forward for Marco to see, she continued by saying, "Soon after that Janna's mom found me and since she is a witch made a charm that allows me to hide on Earth and have legs as long as I'm not in salt water. She was nice enough to let me live with her and Janna, homeschooled me for sixth grade to make sure I knew enough not to embarrass myself."

"You know that actually explains why Janna keeps trying to steal Star's spell book." Marco said. "But why do you want to stay here, your dimension looked pretty peaceful."

"What you saw was only the surface. I bet you only saw mermaids and shark-people." Jackie stated. When she saw Marco nod his head she continued, "I bet you didn't see any of the Eel people my dad conquered to celebrate my third birthday." Marco could see the anger behind her eyes as she spoke, "Not all monarch are as benevolent as the Butterflys. My dad is nothing but a war monger while my mom is a bitch who doesn't care as long as she gets new jewelry. Do you know why I ran away Marco?" Jackie asked, all her secrets pouring out, "I found out my dad was going to have me marry a hammerhead prince so he could have a big enough army to conquer some Manta ray people that were protecting several other less militaristic towns. I didn't want that, it would serve no purpose except to promote violence, so I went to the portal canyon and swam through the first one I found, I left and I don't regret it!" Jackie yelled as she finished.

As Jackie started panting from her outburst, Marco asked, "Better now?" Seeing her nod, the boy decided to steer the conversation away to a more pleasant topic. "So why is your hair blond with that green stretch? The portrait showed you had your mother's hair."

Jackie didn't seem to mind the mention of her mother, instead she answered, "Something Janna's mom taught me is that a witch's magic always has a price. I was lucky that she didn't ask for much, just the color of my hair save for a few strands to remind me that I'm not human."

"Cool," Marco replied, then asked, "So since you're a mermaid, have any special abilities or can you just swim fast?"

Jackie smirked as she said "Watch this." Marco saw Jackie raise her hand, her palm facing the ocean. A look of concentration crossed her face and to Marco's amazement he saw a small part of the ocean rise upwards and collect into a sphere. He never caught the hint of mischief in his crush's eyes as, with a quick flick of her wrist, Jackie sent the water hurtling toward Marco, hitting the boy straight in the chest. Instead of being angry Marco laughed as he said, "That's pretty good. Star also mentioned something about how you can make where people can't remember your face."

"Yeah, sorry about that Marco." Jackie said as she looked at her feet. "I didn't know I'd be staying in this dimension when I saved you. I thought it would be best that you pass me off as a delusion and just forgot about it."

Marco blushed as he said, "You're not someone that I would want to forget about."

Jackie's head immediately sprang up as she looked wide-eyed at Marco, then blushed as she asked, "Do you mean…?"

Marco nodded his head as he said, "I do."

The next few moments were awkward between the two, but then Jackie smiled and got ready to say something. However, before she could talk a new voice made itself known as it said, "Princess Jackie, your father would like for you to return home." Walking out of the waves was one of King Mano's elite guards. Marco could see that the shark-man had a light blue body with a number of black stripes running horizontally along his back. He wasn't as bulky as what Marco had seen in King Mano's portrait, but he knew this foe was both fast and strong. What really worried Marco was the metal spear strapped to the shark-man's back.

Jackie however was not intimidated. She made this known when she said, "Go back and tell that bastard I'm not coming home."

The shark-man reached for his spear as he said, "It was not a request."

Knowing a fight was about to occur, and not sure how well Jackie could handle herself, he stepped forward and said, "I think she's made it clear she doesn't want to go."

The shark-man glared at Marco as he said, "This doesn't concern you boy."

"It concerns me whenever it involves my friends." With that Marco charged the shark-man, hoping to use the element of surprise to get in a debilitating strike. Marco's plan actually succeeded, his opponent did not expect him to rush head first into a fight, resulting in Marco landing a solid hit on the shark-man's diaphragm. Marco felt some small victory as he caused the shark-man to gasp for breath, but his luck soon turned.

As his opponent gathered his breath, he used the staff of his spear to sweep Marco's legs from underneath him. Marco landed on the ground, only regaining his senses to roll out of the way of a spear strike. Once he was able to stand, he didn't fare much better either. He did manage to dodge or redirect the shark-man's strikes, if just by a hair, but he was constantly on defense never having the time to counterattack.

Marco then saw that his opponent was going to try to hit him with the staff of the spear again. Quickly forming a plan, Marco grabbed on to the wood with both hands. Although he did not have the strength to stop the move, resulting in the two combatants spinning in a circle, he did manage to hang on. When he saw the shark-man start to tire, he made his move. Using all his strength to launch himself forward, Marco landed a head butt on his opponent's nose. As the shark-man let go to rub his injured appendage, Marco broke the spear tip off the weapon, and armed himself with the staff.

Marco fought with renewed vigor, able to land more strikes against his opponent. Throughout the fight, Jackie watched, enthralled with the action. She wished she could do something to help, but she knew that she didn't have the training to go up against one of her father's elites and if she ran to get help there was no guarantee that Marco would be alive when she got back. Finally, she though of one thing she could do. When the shark-man pulled back to launch a punch against Marco, Jackie willed a large amount of water to grab his hand and hold it back. While he was distracted Marco launched a strike that knocked out a few teeth.

For the next thirty minutes Marco and Jackie tag teamed the shark-man as such. While they believed that they were close to victory, in truth they were far from it. True, they had injured the elite far more than he had been in recent fights. True, he was becoming winded. However, he was also getting annoyed and angry at the duo. Deciding that enough is enough, the elite made a play to end the fight. Moving quickly, the shark-man kicked up a large amount of sand Jackie's way, causing the girl to lose her concentration. Once one nuisance was taken care or, he focused on Marco.

Marco tried to land another strike with the end of the staff, however the elite caught the wood and dragged Marco forward faster than he could drop the weapon. With quickness Marco was not expecting, the shark-man hit Marco in the shoulder. The boy instantly felt pain, knowing his shoulder was either dislocated or broken. Before he could process this, he was slammed down onto the beach, a knee pinned his body to the ground, his arms where held above his head.

"Well kid, you gave it a good fight," the elite said as he unsheathed a knife, "but it ends here."

Before the shark-man could bring his blade down he was stopped by a voice yelling out, "WAIT!" After making sure Marco couldn't escape, the elite turned to face Jackie. "If I…if I go back, will you let him go?" she asked.

"That is my mission."

The beach was still for what seemed like an eternity. Finally Jackie, while looking down at her feet, barely whispered, "I'll go."

"No, Jackie don't do this!" Marco yelled. He knew he could think of a way to get out of this, he just needed more time.

"Quiet you." the elite commanded. Turning to Jackie, he motioned with his knife, "Get into the surf, then throw your charm over here." Slowly, Jackie walked into the water, her head held down in defeat. Marco could only watch as Jackie followed the shark-man's demands, he noticed when she seemed to stumble a little, her shorts, socks, and shoes washing up onto the beach a few moments later. When she was waist deep, Jackie slowly took off her seashell necklace, then threw it onto the beach, landing right in front of Marco.

Nodding to himself, the elite got off of Marco and went into the water. Marco tried to get up, to hit the shark-man, to tackle him, to do something, but the adrenaline from the fight had now vanished. Exhaustion caught up to the boy, the pain in his shoulder became even more intense, he weakly kneeled in front of the discarded necklace. "Jackie…"

Jackie cut him off before he could say anything else. She didn't turn back to face him, knowing if she did she wouldn't be able to leave. "Thanks for the past few days, I've had a lot of fun. I wish I could stay longer, goodbye Marco." Marco saw Jackie start to lean forward, then in a flash of blue she was gone. The elite soon followed to ensure his mission was complete.

* * *

Marco didn't move for what seemed like a lifetime. Finally, with a shaky hand, he reached out and picked up Jackie's necklace. As he stared at it, his mind brought up memories old and new. He remembered when he was eleven and starting seventh grade, how a girl on a skateboard ran into him, and helped him up but all he could think of was how beautiful she was. He remembered how in eighth grade he walked by the skate park and saw the amazing tricks she could do, how it was the first time he was tempted to sneak into his dad's shed and grab his skateboard so he could join her. But most of all, he remembered the times he would catch a fleeting glimpse of her smiling or laughing and wished that just for once that he was the one to cause such a glorious sight. As the memories came, Marco began to cry at having lost the chance to get to know such an amazing person. This was how Janna found him, not knowing of the fight and wanting to see what was taking so long. When she didn't see Jackie and asked where she was, Marco slowly got up. As he walked away, he gave a simple answer.

"She went home."

* * *

 **Wow, I did not expect the chapter to be this long. I honestly thought that this was going to be 8, maybe 10 pages, but I ended up going to the end of page 18!**

 **An interesting thing about this chapter is that the part at the gym literally came to me as soon as I started typing. I planned on just having Marco tell his story then jumping to the next day, but as I started I figured that would be a little boring for the readers and gave me the opportunity for a little Marco and Jackie bonding time.**

 **What are your thoughts on the fight scene? A little longer than the one in chapter one isn't it? I actually don't have that much confidence for fight scenes, I think my strengths lie more in the dialogue, so let me know if you thought it was okay and if not how I could improve for future projects.**

 **That brings me to another subject, reviews. I won't be an author who demands a specific number of reviews before they start working on the next update but here's the thing, I like knowing what my readers think, even if they have thoughtful critiques and even if they leave a guest review. I appreciate whenever someone leaves a review, and I often let them know as such. At the time I'm writing this, this story is just under 700 views, has 11 followers, and 7 reviews. Let's see if we can get the number of reviews up to 12 before I post the last chapter (which I'll start working on this Friday).**

 **So, with Jackie being a mermaid we answered almost all of the questions from the past few chapters, but more have popped up such as…**

 **What will Marco do now?**

 **Will this story have a happy ending?**

 **How many people cried towards the end of this chapter? (I'll admit I teared up some, and I'm the one writing this!)**

 **All these questions and many more (except the last one, own up to it in the reviews or it will forever be a mystery) will be answered in the conclusion of** _ **The Runaway**_ **!**

 **Until then, this is acw28 saying, "until next update."**


	4. Rescue by Kidnapping?

**Hey everyone, it's acw28 here with the next chapter of** _ **The Runaway**_ **!**

 **So, as I said I started working on this chapter on Friday 7/17. So far I've gotten three more reviews and as I can't directly respond to them as they are guest reviews, I figured I'd respond to them here.**

 **So first up I got a Starco fan, I'm not a huge fan of the pairing for Marco and Star, but I don't hate it either. I just like the Marco Jackie pairing better, and I feel that fans that think likewise are underrepresented in the fandom, it's part of the reason why I wrote this story. I would hope that as the series continues, or if people are inspired by this story, that more Marco Jackie stories will appear on this site. However, in the end the pairings shouldn't matter that much if you enjoy the story, and if the pairings are a deal breaker then just don't read it.**

 **Next I had a guest, Luigi S Mariano, ask when the next chapter is going to come out. Let me make one thing clear to all of my readers, of this work or any of my other stories they decided to look at, I will not give a specific day on my updates. My writing style tends to be spontaneous, I'll have periods where I'm extremely productive and can write and edit multiple 20+ page chapters within weeks of each other, but then I'll have slumps where I can't for the life of me write a good scene. I also feel that the irregularity in my update pace gives my readers a nice surprise when they get an alert. I've had day's before that were just absolutely terrible, but got a little better when I saw one of my favorite stories had a new chapter.**

 **Lastly, I've got another guest, JW TS, asking me to keep up the good work. First, thanks for the complement, I'll try to maintain my quality of writing and I hope you will enjoy this chapter. So that's all of the guest reviews at the time I'm starting this, if I see anymore posted I'll respond to them in the end note.**

 **Now I know that I said this was the last chapter, but I have my reasons for extending the story, which I'll discuss later.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own** _ **Star vs. the Forces of Evil**_ **, if I did this would be canon instead of fanfiction.**

* * *

Although it couldn't have been more than thirty minutes, the walk home seemed to last forever for Marco. He was lucky his shoulder had only been dislocated, he painfully popped it back into place before he left Jackie's and Janna's house.

'No, just Janna's house now.' he mentally corrected himself.

The moment he stepped into his own house, Star immediately ran down the stairs. "So did you tell her? What did she tell you? Does she feel the same way? Are you two going out now?" As she bombarded her friend with questions, Star kept jumping up and down, too excited to stand still. All of that excitement vanished with Marco's response.

"Star would you just shut up!" the boy yelled. Seeing his friend start to tear up, Marco sighed before saying, "I'm sorry for yelling Star. Turns out Jackie ran away from her home dimension, somehow her dad found out she was here on Earth and sent a goon to grab her." Marco began heading toward the stairs as he said, "Me and Jackie fought him for awhile, then he pinned me down and was going to stab me, so Jackie agreed to go home if I was let go." As his tale finished Star could see the sadness in Marco's eyes. "Now, I've had a long day and I just want it to end. Night Star."

Star watched as Marco walked to his room and closed the door, the hearts on her cheeks now broken until suddenly they were replaced with a light bulb. Maybe Marco couldn't do anything more for Jackie, but Star's father probably could. After all, he wasn't king for nothing.

* * *

After running into her room, Star stood in front of her magic mirror and said, "Mirror, mirror, call Dad."

After a few short moments Star's reflection changed to an image of a short man with blue eyes, blond hair, and a forked beard that went half way down his body. "Star do you have any idea what time it is? Why would you call this late?" King Butterfly asked his daughter.

"Dad, this is going to sound a little weird, and maybe a little wild, but you have to help Marco!"

"Marco, isn't he the magic ear of corn that's been spreading mud on the royal carpets?"

"No, that's a different Marco." Star said, amazed at how many things in Mewni shared names with people from Earth. "The Marco that needs our help is Marco Diaz, the boy whose family I'm staying with while on Earth. Some things have happened and now a girl he likes is in trouble."

King Butterfly was now fully awake. Seeing the concern Star had for her friend, King Butterfly said, "Let's see if there is any way we can help, tell me everything." Star took a deep breath before quickly explaining of how Marco had a crush on Jackie, who was really a mermaid princess who ran away from her own dimension, and how Jackie agreed to go back to her home so that Marco wouldn't get hurt. As she told her tale, Star's father would occasionally nod his head to show he was still paying attention. After she concluded her tale, King Butterfly spoke up saying, "I'll look through the interdimensional laws, you might want to have Marco look through your copy as well. But Star," the King quickly added after seeing his daughter start to rush off, "you need to realize we might not be able to do much, Jackie went willingly, short of starting a war, we might not be able to do anything save file an official protest. Do you understand?"

Star was sad to hear this, but knew there were some things that her father wouldn't do, such as endangering his subjects. Reluctantly Star nodded her head as she said, "I understand Dad."

"Don't look so glum Star, I promise if we find anything you'll be the first to know." With that the King cut the call. Nodding to herself, Star quickly ran to her bookshelf to grab three thick books before going to Marco's room. Star found her friend laying on his bed facing the wall. Taking a moment to set the books on his desk, Star began by saying, "I told my Dad what happened, he suggested looking through these books to see if we could find something." When Marco still didn't respond, Star sighed and started walking out of the room, but stopped at the door to say, "If there's a way to get Jackie back, we'll find it Marco. Good night."

* * *

After Star left his room, Marco rolled onto his back. Digging into his jacket pocket, Marco pulled out Jackie's seashell necklace. He didn't know how long he held it up and just stared at it, only to be startled by a voice saying, "Mopping around isn't going to bring her back you know."

After failing around for a second, Marco turned his head to Janna. "How did you get in here?"

In response, the girl pulled something out of her pocket. Holding them up, Janna said, "I "found" these a few minutes ago." In her hands were Marco's house keys. Continuing, the girls said, "Why are you mopping around anyway, I thought you would be looking for a way to get Jackie back."

"I can't do anything," Marco said, "she went back willingly. According to Star's Dad the only thing that could help is if he had Mewni go to war." Sitting up to grab his keys out of the girl's hand, Marco asked, "Why do you keep doing that? Stealing my keys, teasing me, flirting with me, do you like me or something? You know there are more effective ways to convey your feelings."

Janna gave a short chuckle before saying, "You're a good guy Marco, but I don't like you like that. I was just trying to get Jackie to hurry up and stack her claim before any other girl did."

"Stake her claim?" Marco asked confused.

Janna rolled her eyes as she said, "She likes you genius, like wants to settle down and have kids "like". Did you honestly expect Jackie to go to the gym dressed like that every time? She was trying to grab your attention, well more then what she already had."

Even more confused, Marco countered by saying, "How could she like me? She hardly ever talked to me, we didn't have a real conversation until after Star came to stay with my family, even that was only a few words."

Janna rubbed her temples, getting tired of explaining all of this. "Look, you remembered you were saved but didn't remember Jackie's face right?" Marco nodded. "Jackie explained to me a few months after she started living with me and my mom, that love for a mermaid is complicated. If a connection is made and the two kiss, they forget each other's face. To prove that the love is real, they have to find each other again. If they can't make a connection again, then it ends."

Now Janna had Marco's full attention as he said, "But I never kissed Jackie."

A smirk appeared on Janna's face as she asked, "When you had your accident, there wasn't any water in your lungs right? Now why do you think that is? Was it luck, or did someone lip lock with you and draw it out?" Seeing the look of realization cross Marco's face, and sensing the next question, Janna continued, "She thought she recognized you the first day of seventh grade, but she felt something different about you. She didn't want to lose you, so she didn't talk to you but she was always there. She kept me up some nights going over her plans to skate by you at just the right moment."

Marco was stunned when he heard this. This period of inactivity didn't last long as faster than she could blink, Janna suddenly saw Marco sitting at his desk flipping through a thick book. After several minutes of watching this, Janna asked, "What are you doing?"

Without looking away from the book, Marco replied, "Star lent me these books, she said that they were interdimensional laws, there should be something in one of them that would help Jackie."

Janna noticed that Marco pointed to two other books, each equally as thick. "You know it's going to take forever to find something that way." Marco glared at her, as if challenging her to have a better idea. Rolling her eyes, Janna grabbed all three of the books as she said, "The order in the chaos," she then threw all three of the books straight into the air, almost touching the ceiling, each fell with a loud thud, two were closed while one was open to a page further back in the book. Careful to keep the book open, Janna picked up the book and handed it to Marco, "this should be your answer."

Marco seemed doubtful, but then read the entry. As his eyes went further down the page, his smile grew. Once he reached the end of the page, he hugged Janna, "Thanks, this just might work." He then released the girl and ran outside to the shed, knowing what supplies he'd need. Janna shrugged off the hug and started to walk out of the room until she notice the books page start to turn, showing more to that particular entry. Janna quickly read the remainder of the law, then started running out of the house as she thought, 'If they use that law they'd either make me the Maid of Honor or dance on my grave.'

* * *

In the shed, Marco quickly found some of the supplies that he needed, then moved his Dad's large tool case a few inches. Reaching behind the tool case, Marco felt his hand land on a large cardboard box. After a minute of struggling, Marco managed to slide the box out and, after taking a few minutes to compose his thoughts, took the lid off. Slowly he reached in and took out a black helmet, noting that he'd have to adjust the chin strap. After putting his helmet on the ground, Marco reached in to pull out the last item he needed for his plan.

Out of the box, Marco pulled out a skateboard with red wheels and a black deck with the outline of a red Ace of Spade in the center of the board. Just holding his old board brought back memories, his first ollie, his first wipe out, and much more rushed past his mind. Marco ideally noticed that his trunks were a bit loose and quickly found a socket wrench to fix it. Nodding at his work, and seeing he had all but one of his supplies, Marco gathered his gear and headed back inside, being sure to stop in the kitchen on the way in.

It was past ten when Marco was ready to put his plan into action. Sneaking into Star's room, Marco quickly spotted what he was looking for. Glad that his friend was such a heavy sleeper, the boy quickly grabbed a pair of red handled scissors and an extremely large book, and quietly walked back into the hallway. Once he reached the living room, Marco set the book down on the coffee table as he said, "Hey, Glossaryck, get out here."

As Marco said these words, the book opened seemingly by itself. Once the pages settled, a small, blue, twelve fingered, bald man with a large gem in his forehead, a white beard and a wearing a yellow shirt and pants began to float out of the book. Once he settled Glossaryck began saying, "Hello Star Butterfly. What can I do…" he then noticed Marco and began saying, "I believe we have had this conversation before Marco Diaz, magical princesses only. Goodbye." Before he could disappear back into the pages of the books, Marco shoved something into Glossaryck's arms. The small man looked down and asked, "Is this?"

Marco nodded his head as he said, "Pudding, double chocolate fudge." The boy then held up the rest of the pack. "You can have that one for free, you can get another two if you do what I ask, the last three are for you to not tell Star or anyone else about this."

Glossarcyk began to float up to Marco's eye level as he said, "Normally I would never accept such a bribe," he then looked to make sure no one was around before continuing, "but how can I refuse such a generous donation?" Marco nodded, handing over the rest of the pudding, with the transaction complete, Glossarcyk asked, "Okay, what can I do for you kid?"

"Star used a spell today, dimensional protection bubble or something like that, how long does it last and can you cast it on me and my gear?"

Glossarcyk was silent for a moment as he slurped a mouthful of pudding down his throat. Once he was able to speak he said, "I know the spell, lasts about 12 hours or 12 dimensions, whichever comes first. As for casting it," the little man snapped his extra fingers to make a white sphere appear in front of him before it rushed and absorbed itself into Marco. "There you go kid, remember I had nothing to do with this." Glossarcyk then grabbed the other five cups of pudding before disappearing back into Star's book.

Nodding to himself Marco grabbed his supplies before using the scissors to open a portal. Stepping through, Marco was glad he managed to get himself back to the dimension he and Star had visited earlier that day. Moving quickly and stealthily, Marco made his way to the princess tower, hoping no one in the castle was awake, it wouldn't bowed well if he got caught too early. Making sure the coast was still clear, Marco started swimming up to the window.

* * *

Jackie questioned how a night with so much promise had turned into such a nightmare. She had decided to sit on the beach and look out onto the ocean after dinner, hoping to figure out some way to tell Marco the truth. Instead Marco had surprised her with the news of his visit to her home dimension. He had found out her secret, and he was cool with it, a major weight off of her shoulders. He had also practically admitted that he liked her in the same way that she liked him! She was sure that she could have gotten a kiss a few minutes after that, but then her father had to ruin everything, like always.

Once she was returned to her home dimension, she was forced to attend a formal dinner to officially welcome her back to her "home." Her mother gave a great performance of how she was so glad her lovely daughter was home safe and how the Queen was so glad to have her daughter home. Jackie might have halfway believed the act, if Queen Circe didn't start showing of the new sapphire necklace she had commissioned for just the occasion. King Mano hardly said a word throughout the meal, just smirking at his future conquests. Jackie also had the _pleasure_ of meeting her fiancé, a tan hammerhead around her age that did nothing but stare at her with lust during the entire dinner. All she wanted to do now was go to bed and pretend this was a terrible nightmare that she could wake up from. Instead she was surprised as she saw someone swim in through her window as she opened her door. Although it took a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, Jackie quickly recognized the figure's red hoodie. "Marco, what are you doing here?"

Marco was startled when someone called his name, but relaxed when he realized it was only Jackie. Before he responded, Marco took half a moment to look over his crush. She still had her unique hair and eyes, but now she had three gills on her cheeks in place of her freckles, he saw her sharp, pointed teeth while she was talking. He also noticed the small dark blue fins on her forearms, her webbed hands, and the dark blue tail where he was used to seeing her legs. Oddly her tail did not end in a flowing fin that was parallel to her hips, instead Jackie's tail ended in two sharp points, much like a shark's tail, that where perpendicular to her hips. The boy tried not to look at Jackie's breasts, which were now secured with a pure white seashell bra and showed a fair amount of cleavage. Taking the other half of the moment to compose himself, Marco said, "So this is what you look like without your necklace," noticing that she wasn't moving, he asked, "how are you floating right now?"

Not missing a beat, Jackie responded by saying, "Internal gas bladder that I learned to regulate when I was a toddler, it's a lot like learn to walk. Now answer my question, why are you here?"

"I think that's pretty obvious isn't it?" Marco replied, "I'm here to get you out of here."

"No Marco, you can't do that." Jackie began, "Look, it's sweet that you're going to such lengths for me, it really is, but this isn't a fairy tale Marco. I may be a princess, but you are not a knight in shining armor, you can't just come and rescue me. I chose this, now you need to get out of here before one of the guards, or worse my father, know that you're here. If they catch you they'll kill you." Jackie continued after that, citing all of the dangers of the castle and how his fate was imitate if he didn't leave immediately.

Instead of going out the window, Marco surprised Jackie by quickly moving toward her. He had come here for her and he was determined not to leave without her. Deciding to wing it, Marco reached out, pulled Jackie towards him, and shocking the girl, pressed his lips to hers. Immediately both teens felt a part of their memory become complete, Marco could finally see the face of the girl that saved him while Jackie could see the face of the boy that stood up to some skater punks. Marco continued the kiss even after that, Jackie responded in kind, closing her eyes and melting into the other teen. When they finally separated the girl was in a state of bliss, but that quickly changed when she noticed her hands were tied behind her back with a piece of rope also immobilizing her tail. Getting angry, Jackie threatened in a low voice, "Marco…"

Marco just smirked as his plan came together. "Sorry Jackie, but I'm not leaving here without you. I know you don't like it here, and it's mostly my fault that here in the first place." Grabbing a gag made from a clean rag out of his large bag of supplies, Marco said, "You are right about how I can't be your knight, so I guess I have to be something else. Oh, and sorry about this."

"Marco Diaz, if you gag me I swear I'll…"however the rest of the threat was cut off as Marco did just that. Seeing the rage in Jackie's eyes, Marco tried to get her into his now empty bag, a process that was made difficult as Jackie emptied her internal gas bladder, becoming dead weight. Once he had the girl in the bag and tied it shut, Marco left a small note, as per the requirements of the particular law he was about to enact.

* * *

After making sure he wasn't going to leave anything behind besides the note, Marco strapped on his helmet, hoisted Jackie over his shoulder, and grabbed his skateboard. Perched on the windowsill, the boy looked downward. It looked to be at least an eighty-foot vertical drop. Flashbacks of his day at the pier quickly came to his mind. Despite his fears, Marco knew he could be discovered at any moment. He couldn't outswim anyone in this dimension, his only hope was to become faster due to an alternative means. Swallowing the lump in his throat, Marco put his other foot on the board, and moved his weight forward.

For the first twenty feet heading down, Marco felt like he was going to throw up. He fought to keep his food in his stomach. After the first twenty feet, Marco realized that his motion sickness was psychosomatic, that he caused himself to be sick at high speeds because he was afraid of getting hurt again. He quickly decided that he could not afford to get sick at such a critical time, when it was not only his future that was on the line, but also that of one of his friends.

Once he had it firmly in his mind that he would no longer get sick, Marco actually began to enjoy himself. He heard the wind, or in this case water, rush past his ears. He felt the start of an adrenalin high. If he was completely honest, he would have to admit that he missed this feeling, and thought himself an idiot for not getting over his fear sooner. Whenever he did something there would always be the risk of getting hurt, he broke his arm twice doing karate for crying out loud. He wondered if Jackie would still be furious at him after this or if she would agree to go skating with him, either way, his days of being the safety kid were done.

As he neared the end of the tower, Marco did a small ollie onto the ground so he wouldn't wreck but could maintain his speed. Marco already knew where he needed to go, stealth now abandoned in favor of speed. He did see some mermaids out in the late night, many gave him strange looks, not sure what to make of the skateboarding teen with a large moving sack on his back. He didn't pay attention to them, it didn't matter if he was discovered now, he just couldn't get caught. Soon his destination came into view, the portal canyon.

'I've got to time this just right.' he thought.

As he would loss his speed if he stopped to observe the portal, he instead opted to skate on the side of the canyon, this possible due to the different physics in the dimension. After making half a pass around the cannon, Marco got the timing down. Right before the portal was about to close, Marco started heading down into the canyon. He just managed to skate halfway down the canyon before the portal reopened perhaps a foot above his head. Happy with his work, Marco pulled out Star's scissors and opened a portal of his own before skating into it.

* * *

After skating into the portal, much of Marco's speed was lost. Emerging on the other side, Marco was saw he was now in the super market like dimension known as Quest Buy. Before he could go any further, one of the sloth-like creatures that inhabited the dimension/ran the store, told him, "Sir, this is a no skateboarding zone."

Marco quickly stopped and picked up his board, "Sorry about that, I was in a bit of a hurry." However the sloth had already walked off. As his plan was working so far, and as he wasn't being followed, Marco decided not to open another portal immediate, but instead make a longer journey for anyone that would pursue him. As he walked out of the center of the store, Marco saw a small, green, goblin like creature imbedding itself in a wall. Remembering his previous visit to this dimension, Marco told the creature, "For house wares you want to go down to isle 25, make a left turn, walk a mile, then take the stairs to the fifth floor." The goblin gave a small groan, but nodded its thanks and started following Marco's directions.

Marco, however, walked over to two elevators and took one up to a certain floor. Walking off the elevator, Marco saw he was at the traps department, the resident sloth employee still stuck in a giant mousetrap. Moving quickly, Marco was able to avoid all of the obstacles, although it was more difficult than his last visit as Jackie had begun to thrash around in an attempt to get her hands untied. Once he was on the other side of the hallway, Marco opened up another portal to a random dimension.

* * *

As soon as Marco stepped out of the portal, a giant treadmill beneath him started moving, bring him towards a giant, dark and ominous looking castle. As soon as he was past the entrance, a metal gate slammed down behind him. Soon the treadmill stopped at an out cove, manned by one of the masked guards Marco recognized from when that one princess tried to steal Star's face. As Marco was about to leave, the guard spoke up saying, "Welcome to Saint Olga's Reform School for Wayward Princesses, and branch of interdimensional law regulation." Seeing the bag on Marco's shoulder, the guard asked, "Dropping off or picking up?"

"Just passing through." Marco was about to open another portal when he turned back and asked, "Excuse me, but did you say interdimensional law regulation?" When the guard nodded, Marco continued and asked, "Could you see if my request has gone through yet, should be under Diaz, Marco."

Marco waited a few moments as the guard typed on his keyboard. "Here it is, the request went through a while ago, the timer will start once you are back in your home dimension."

After hearing this, Marco, nodded his thanks before opening another portal and stepping through. However, unknown to Marco, another person had witnessed his talk with the guard and as they saw Marco leave, thought, 'I don't know what Earth turd was doing here, but I've got to tell B-fly about this.'

* * *

As Marco exited the portal, he found himself in a dimension filled with fire and brimstone. As he began skating, he thought to himself, 'Okay, I have no idea where I'm at. Oh well, a walk here should delay anyone coming after me for long enough.' Noticing Jackie's movement's inside the bag had become much more subdued, he thought, 'I hope Jackie's alright, the bubble spell should have created a pocket of water for her to be comfortable in.' What Marco didn't know was that Jackie had stopped focusing on the ropes of her arms and tail and instead was trying to bite through the gag. She hoped she could talk to Marco and try to figure out what this crazy plan was, or at the very least be able to bite a hole in the bag.

Marco was so lost in his thoughts that he didn't notice someone walking in front of him until they collided. "Watch where you're going you idiot. Oh, it's you. What are you doing here human?" Marco looked up to see a purplish-pink skinned teenage boy with red hair, horns, and three red eyes wearing a torn red t-shirt with a star and torn green shorts.

Getting up, Marco began to skate away as he called over his shoulder, "I don't have time to mess with you today Tom, see ya."

As Marco skated away, Tom called after him, "You're lucky my life coach advised me to let go of past grudges Diaz, I'm still mad about what you did at the ball! If you hadn't spilled punch on my tux I would have had a dance with Star!"

By now Marco had already opened up a portal, but called over his shoulder, "The spot light thing didn't choose anyone this year, you didn't have a chance with Star and you still don't!" as he exited the dimension.

As Tom was plotting his vengeance, he recalled that Marco had a large bag over his shoulder. 'That human wouldn't, would he?' The teen demon then smirked viciously as he thought, 'Doesn't matter, I just need a small portion of the truth to tell Star. Once she knows what her precious human is doing, she'll come back to me.' Tom then had to fight the urge to laugh manically, his life coach had advised him to tone down the evil just slightly so as not to attract unwanted attention.

* * *

Skating out of the portal, Marco was once more in a depressing dimension, only instead of fire and brimstone, Marco was surrounded by high cliffs and darkness. Once more Marco had no idea where the portal had taken him, but figured it out once he saw a red skinned, two headed, horned monster smashing rocks together.

'Ludo's dimension, I just can't get a break with this thing can I?' As soon as that thought passed, Marco got another idea popped into Marco's head, 'Wait, when I tried helping Lobster Claws he said he could never show his face on Mewni again, does Ludo live on Mewni?' Marco answered his own question when he saw a familiar castle in the distance. As he skated toward the "light side" of the dimension, Marco called over his shoulder, "You okay back their Jackie?" In response he heard some water swishing around and a muffled answer. Taking it to be something positive instead of another threat, Marco said, "Great, now let's get out of here."

* * *

King Butterfly was out in the woods monster hunting. Yes, he had promised his daughter that he would look into trying to help her friend rescue his mermaid princess, and he had been doing that for over an hour. He had found one answer besides war, but it was hardly a perfect solution. A king could only take so much stress before it started to affect how he ruled his kingdom. Leaving the task to his trusted aid Manfred, the king snuck out of the castle to do some light tracking.

Imagine his surprise when he saw a red streak past by in the corner of his eye. Standing stock still, King Butterfly slowly rotated his head to get a better look at this mysterious beast, only to see it was a boy wearing a strange red jacket. When the boy turned to face the concealed king, King Butterfly was shocked to see it was Marco, he had meet the boy briefly at one time or another. 'He couldn't be doing _that_ could he?' the king questioned himself as he watched the boy disappear into another portal. Once he was alone, King Butterfly muttered to himself, "I better tell Star about this."

* * *

As Marco opened the latest portal, he thought, 'That should be good enough, time to get home.' When he used the scissors, he concentrated on returning to Earth. When he skated through the portal, he went a couple of feet before running into a wall. After the ringing in his ear stopped. Marco looked around to see that was in a small village, most likely somewhere in Europe.

"Just where am I?" the boy questioned aloud, surprised when he got an answer.

"You're in Arendelle." Marco didn't see anyone until a the same voice said, "Down here." When Marco looked down, he was shocked to see a small, talking snowman that wasn't melting in the heat due to a small snow storm above it's head. "Hi, I'm Olaf, I like warm hugs."

"Hi, I'm Marco," 'and somehow I feel like I should be more surprised by this.'

Olaf then noticed the bag, with movement inside due to Jackie renewing her struggle, over Marco's shoulder and asked, "What's in there?"

Marco took a second before he responded by saying, "Something very close to my heart that I hold dear." Taking out the borrowed scissors, Marco opened up another portal, this time concentrating on America, and said, "By Olaf, it was nice meeting you." before he skated through.

"Bye Marco, bye Marco's moving sack." After Marco had disappeared, Olaf said aloud, "I should tell Elsa and Anna about my new friend."

* * *

The good news was that the portal Marco opened took him to the United States. The bad news was that it opened on the roof of a tall building. Marco was too going too fast and was too close to the edge to stop, resulting in him, Jackie, and his board falling off the roof. Marco was in free fall for perhaps five seconds before something grabbed the back of his hoodie in one hand and his board in the other, somehow Marco had managed to keep a hold on his bag.

"Easy there kid, I've got you." Looking up, Marco saw what could only be described as a red and yellow metal man. Once they were safely on the ground, the man began to give a lecture to Marco, "Now I hope you realize how stupid it is to be skating on the roofs."

"Yes sir, it won't happen again sir." Marco had decided to just play along and get away quickly and open up another portal. Unfortunately, it was at this moment that Jackie was able to bite through her gag.

"Marco Diaz, you let me out of this bag this instant! If you think I'm going to develop Stockholm syndrome you have another thing coming!"

Neither Marco or the metal man moved, until the man said, "Marco was it? Why don't you do us both a favor and open the bag." In response, Marco chuckled nervously before he started skating down an alleyway. The metal man only shook his head as he muttered, "They always choose to run. Jarvis, do a search on "Marco Diaz" and see if he is related to any recently reported kidnappings." The metal man then flew to the other end of the ally and seeing that Marco had taken out a pair of scissors asked, "Didn't your mother ever tell you not to skate with," however he had to stop himself as Marco opened another portal, "scissors?" the metal man weakly finished as Marco disappeared.

"Sir," a voice inside the metal man's helmet said, "I have located several individuals named "Marco Diaz", but none match the physical description of our kidnapper and none have any prior criminal recorder."

The metal man just nodded his head slowly, staring at the air where the boy that didn't exist had disappeared. "Jarvis, do a new search on dimensional portal openings and call the rest of the team for me would ya?"

* * *

Marco knew it was stupid to open a portal right in front of the metal man, but he didn't have any other choice. This time he focused on land west of the Mississippi river. As seemed to be the common theme for the day, or was it night?, Marco soon encountered a problem with this new dimension, that being a tree right in front of his path. The crash was unavoidable, leaving Marco's hand slightly injured. Marco was beginning to question how he would get the hang of dimension jumping when a voice got his attention.

Standing in front of the teen were five kids, maybe around eight years old. He noted that he was in a fenced back yard of a yellow house. Not catching what he was asked the first time, Marco said, "I'm sorry I didn't get that, could you repeat it?"

The first boy to his left, a red head with an interestingly shaped head, replied, "I asked if you were okay, you hit our tree pretty hard."

"Yeah I'm fine, I wore my helmet," Marco gave a quick knock on his helmet, "I just tore up my hand a bit." Faster than he expected, the lone girl of the group was at his side and bandaging up his cut. "Wow, that was fast."

"Of course, a Fireside girl is always prepared."

Marco didn't know what a Fireside girl was, but figured it was something like a Girl Scout. While he was preoccupied with this thought, and with the girl finished bandaging his hand, he didn't notice her start walking toward his bag, which contained a slightly dazed Jackie.

"Hey, what's in here?"

"No don't open that!" But before Marco could act the girl had already untied the bag. Some water leaked out as Jackie's head appeared out of the bag, her mermaid features on full display.

"Thanks kid, it was getting stuffy in there."

While the kids were too shocked to reach, Marco quickly took action. After quickly saying, "Sorry about this Jackie," Marco gently pushed her head back into the bag and tied it shut. He then opened another portal and exited the dimension before anyone could say or do anything.

"We just saw a mermaid, scientifically that should be impossible." the Indian boy of the group said.

"We've been to outer space multiple times, had a 32 hour long day, and proved the existence of a living old timey swimsuit. I think a mermaid is par for the course." the group's bulky boy responded.

"Hmmm, that looked like an inter-dimensional portal. Is anyone else getting déjà vu?" the red head asked. After everyone nodded their head, the boy turned to the last member of the group, who somehow possessed green hair, and said, "Ferb I know what we're going to do today." After a short pause a teenage girl form inside the house called out, "Hey have any of you seen Perry, it's time for his vet appointment."

* * *

Marco was seriously started to question his luck, or maybe his karma got screwed up when he kidnapped Jackie. Either way, he focused on the west coast when he opened the newest portal. Instead of skating out onto a beach, Marco was surrounded by woods. 'This isn't California,' the boy thought, 'this looks more like Oregon.'

Before he could think about anything else, Marco ran over a decent sized rock, causing him to wreck. While Marco got his chin rubbed, his bag was sent flying forward. Due to his hasty tie job in the last dimension, Jackie soon came rolling out of the bag. Upon seeing this, Marco instantly got up and ran to her as he asked, "Jackie are you alright?"

"Oh, so know you care about my wellbeing?" the mermaid asked as she glared at Marco.

"What are you talking about, I've always cared."

"Really?" Jackie rolled her eyes before she continued, "Since when is kidnapping a gesture of endearment?"

"You didn't want to be there, we both know it."

Getting tired of arguing, Jackie yelled, "That doesn't matter! It was my choice to go back and you had now right to force this on me!"

Marco was shocked at how angry Jackie was. Yeah, he didn't expect her to be over the moon at the prospect of him kidnapping her, but he had thought she'd be more neutral about it and just go with the flow. "You're right," Marco finally admitted after a long silence, "it was your choice to go back, but it was my fault that you needed to make that choice." Hearing the remorse in Marco's voice, Jackie temporarily forgot about her rage. "It was probably the visit that me and Star took that tipped your father off about you being on Earth," Marco continued, his voice full of sorrow, "if I had fought a bit harder and didn't have a knife about to slit my throat open, you wouldn't have to go back to save my life."

After Marco's speech, the air between the two was silent before Marco let out a great sigh. "I actually do have a plan about how to fix this, but looking at it now I have to admit that it's half assed and has a very small chance of actually working. But what's worse," here Marco stared directly into Jackie's eyes, "is that I didn't even ask if this is what you wanted." Standing up, Marco made Jackie an offer, "If you want to go home, I'll stop all of this and take you back to your room."

Jackie was silent before she let out her own sigh of frustration. She had been ready to tear into Marco, but then he goes and says something like that. "Well, it does seem like you actually put some thought into this, so let's compromise. Untie me and then let's see how this whole kidnapping thing plays out." Marco quickly nodded his answer before he untied Jackie arm's and tail. After getting the mermaid back into the bag, with her head sticking out and her arms wrapped around Marco's neck, Marco opened up another portal, this time focusing on California.

* * *

While all of this was occurring, three twelve year olds saw everything from a nearby hill. The lone boy of the group, who had brown hair and wore and orange shirt with a blue hooded vest and a blue and white baseball hat, said, "Am I crazy or did that guy just appear out of a portal."

One of the girls, who could possible be his twin and wore a large sweater with a pine tree pattern knitted into it, replied, "You're not crazy bro-bro, and it sounds like he kidnapped that mermaid. We've got to help her, she might now were Mermando is."

Before the two twins could go charging down the hill, the other girl, a blond wearing a lavender dress, a purple jacket, black leggings, and brown boots, grabbed them by the back of their shirt and sweater. "Oh no you don't. I agreed to hang out with you two in the woods today as long as we didn't chase after anything supernatural. Besides," the blond pointed to Marco untying Jackie's arms, "it looks like they worked it out. Let's leave them alone."

The two twins reluctantly followed, although the boy pulled a worn journal from his vest pocket. 'Now let's see what the author wrote about portals.'

* * *

Marco seemed to be getting the hang of the scissors. Exiting out of the portal in an ally way, Marco looked around to see several tall buildings. At first he thought he was in San Francisco, but didn't remember the city having so many blimps. Jackie seemed to have similar thoughts as she said, "I think we're on the wrong Earth." and pointed to a parked bus that read, "CITY OF SAN FRANSOKYO." After a moment of silence, Jackie asked, "Back in the bag?"

"Back in the bag." Marco confirmed. Once Jackie was safely concealed, Marco started Skating out of the ally and began looking for an ideal place to open another portal. After several minutes of skating, and trying to figure out what he should think about for his next portal, what could only be described as a large, white, walking beach ball stepped out of an ally in front of Marco. Thankfully, the object seemed to be mostly air and Marco was uninjured.

"I apologize for that," the walking beach ball said, "I am Baymax, your personal healthcare companion."

Before Marco could reply, a dark haired boy around Marco's age ran out of the ally telling the beach ball, "Baymax, I told you that you can't just walk off alone like that." Turing to Marco, the boy said, "Sorry about him, I just updated his programing and he is a little curious. I'm Hiro by the way."

"Marco, and it's alright, no one got hurt."

While the two boys were having a short chat, Baymax scanned Marco to be sure he had not caused the boy any injuries. The scan showed only a minor skin abrasion that had already received treatment, but what caught the robot's attention was what he had accidently scanned.

"Hiro," the robot said to gain the boy's attention, "the lifeform inside Marco's bag does not match any entry in my biology database."

"Wait, what?" Hiro asked as he turned to face his robot. Sensing trouble, Marco took the opportunity to open another portal, this time focusing on high school. By the time Hiro turned back around, Marco was gone. "Baymax, what happened?"

"When you turned around the boy, Marco, pulled out a pair of scissors and opened what appeared to be a portal."

After a moment of silence to reflect what Baymax had said, Hiro sighed and began to rub his temples as he said, "Could you call the gang? Maybe Wasabi or Honey Lemon can figure this out."

* * *

The portal opened up in a regular high school hallway, however as it was inside Marco knew that they weren't in Echo Creek. Seeing no one was around, Marco called over his shoulder, "I think we're alone, you can come out of the bag." before he started skating around.

"Thanks," Jackie said as her head and arms popped out of the bag, "it's a little disorientating in there. Any idea where we're at?"

"No clue." Marco then remembered something Jackie had said earlier in their journey. Smiling, he said, "You know I think it's pretty easy to get Stockholm syndrome when you already like your kidnapper."

Jackie blushed as she asked, "Wh-what are you talking about Marco?"

Marco chuckled slightly before he said, "Janna told me everything before I went to grab you."

Jackie was silent for a moment before Marco felt her anger, he was just glad it wasn't directed at him. "Of course she did," Jackie ranted, "when we get home I am going to bite her head off!"

"Literally or metaphorically?" Marco asked.

Jackie shrugged her shoulders as she said, "I haven't decided yet." Marco would have responded, but before he could speak a mob of students started running around him, too scared to notice the mermaid on his back. Curious as to what was going on, Marco looked to Jackie and in silent agreement, the two decided to check it out.

When Marco rounded the corner, he saw a teen his age wearing a black and red ninja suit with a long red scarf fighting against a large, plant like monster. Gently setting Jackie down, Marco said, "I've got to help." Jackie nodded her head and said, "I figured you would." She then quickly grabbed Marco's head and pulled it down so she could give the boy a quick kiss. After releasing Marco and seeing his blush, she said, "For luck." Marco nodded his head as he skated into the fight.

He arrived just in time as the monster used one of it's tentacles to trip the ninja and was about to deliver an overhead strike only for Marco to do a handstand and block the tentacle with his board. The ninja nodded his thanks as he said, "That was pretty bruce, but you should probably get out of here now."

In response, Marco set his board down and said, "Where I come from, I tend to fight a few monsters from time to time," 'although their usually a lot smaller.' he finished in his mind as he settled into his karate stance.

After the ninja got to his feet, the duo continued the fight, dodging attacks and launching quick counters. This pattern continued for about five minutes until the monster wrapped Marco up in several tentacles. Then ninja saw this happen and quickly yelled out, "Ninja Rings!" as he threw three small bladed discs, which cut the tentacles off of the monster's body. As Marco regained his footing he commented, "That has got to hurt."

"Oh don't worry, she'll be fine when she de-stanks."

"Wait, you know who that is?" Marco asks.

"Well yeah, all the monsters here are just students who are possessed."

"So then how do we de-possess them?" Marco asked.

"You have to destroy what they hold most dear, usually for her it's a twirling baton." Marco quickly noted that there wasn't a baton present.

"Well that's stupid," Jackie called from the sidelines, "if you just destroy something they'll replace it. Does she have a boyfriend?" the ninja shook his head no, "Does she have a guy she likes?" the ninja nodded his head as he blocked a tentacle, "Does he like her back?"

The ninja scratched the back of his head as he said, "I think he does."

"Then go get him so he can calm her down!" Jackie commanded.

The ninja looked at Jackie for a second before turning to Marco and asking, "And just who is she?"

"Just do it!" Marco yelled as he ducked under a tentacle. "She tends to be right about things." The ninja nodded before pulling something out from behind his back and throwing it to the ground with a cry of, "SMOKE BOMB!"

Marco coughed as the smelly cloud dissipated, "That really does stink."

Unfortunately, while Marco was distracted, the monster took the opportunity to pounce. With Marco pinned to the ground, he could do nothing as the monster roared in his face. The boy thought he was a goner before he heard a voice say, "Theresa?"

Turning the corner was a teenage boy with purple hair wearing a red shirt with a single white stripe and a dark hoodie. Marco had no idea who this guy was, but apparently the monster did as it, or rather she, said, "Randy?"

Slowly moving forward, Randy said, "Theresa, you need to calm down."

That was the wrong thing to say as Theresa only got angrier, and griped Marco harder, as she said, "Randy doesn't like me!"

"No, no, no," Randy quickly said as he waved his arms, "look you heard me at a bad time. Howard found out that I like you and wouldn't stop being a shoob about it and I was getting tired of it. I ended up saying something that I didn't mean, and you heard it."

Theresa seemed to relax as her grip on Marco lessened to the extent that he could slip away. Theresa wasn't paying attention to him as all of her focus was on Randy as she asked in a voice full of hope, "Randy likes Theresa?"

Randy took another step forward as he said, "Yes, I do."

"Randy like Theresa!" the monster exclaimed as she rushed forward. As the plant-like creature jumped in the air, a fog of green smoke emitted from it's body. Once the smoke dissipated, the monster was replaced by a teenage girl with short purple hair wearing what was remarkably similar to an Echo Creek High cheerleader uniform. The girl sailed through the air before she collided with Randy, the impact sending them both into the nearest wall. Neither teen seemed to mind much as they were currently in the midst of making-out.

Marco quickly collected his skateboard and walked back to Jackie. After picking her up, the boy started to skate away as Jackie asked, "Should we really just leave them there?"

Marco waved off her question and said, "They'll be fine, that guy is the ninja I was fighting alongside earlier." Seeing the question on his crush's face, Marco said, "It's a martial arts thing." before he opened his next, and hopefully last, portal.

Even with most of his mind preoccupied, Randy was able to see the flash of color out of the corner of his eye. 'Guess I'll have to see what the Nomicon has on portals, I need to thank those two for earlier and for now.'

(A/N If anyone gets all those references and knows what they all have in common, they can help themselves to a virtually cookie, I hope I mad enough. (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::).)

* * *

As Marco exited the portal, he found that he was in front of the gym where he and Jackie had had their "date."

"Yes, finally, we're home." Marco almost yelled as he didn't want to wake anyone up. Despite it being day in almost every dimension he travelled to, it was still the middle of the night in Echo Creek.

"Good," Jackie yawned as she slid back into the bag, "wake me up when we stop."

Marco absentmindedly nodded to Jackie's request as he skated home. Once there, he quietly snuck up the stairs to Stars room. After putting the pair of scissors where they belong, he then walked to the second story, and with the assistance of a ladder, tried to put Jackie in Star's large salt-water aquarium. However, Jackie woke up in the process and used all her weight to force Marco off the ladder, then pinned him to the ground. "I can't believe you!" Jackie whispered-yelled, not wanting to wake up Star. "You go through all the trouble of kidnapping me, getting me to trust you, just to put me on display, you're no better than my parents!"

"I'm only following the rules," Marco hastily replied, "and it's not like I want to do this, but however slim the chance someone could track us through all the portals. I planned on having you wear this," Marco pulled Jackie's old necklace out of his jacket pocket, "since you said you used it to hide before. However, you said it doesn't give you legs in salt-water, this is the only tank that I know big enough. It's that or walk around in only your seashell bra."

Jackie could see the logic in Marco's statement, and the remorse in his eyes for putting her in the tank. Releasing a groan, Jackie said, "Fine, but you aren't allowed to enjoy this and we never speak of it."

After getting Jackie in the tank, Marco asked, "Is there anything special you want for breakfast tomorrow?"

Jackie didn't hesitate as she said, "Scrambled eggs, ham, bacon, some sausage, and a waffle." Seeing the wide eyes that Marco was giving her, Jackie asked, "What? Is the waffle too much?"

Marco shook his head before saying, "No, it's just that's a lot of meat."

"What do you expect?" Jackie countered as she flashed Marco a smile showing off her pointed teeth, "I do have a lot of shark in me after all."

Marco only nodded his head before he started walking to his own room for some well deserved rest.

* * *

 **And so ends chapter 4 of** _ **The Runaway**_ **with 18 pages.**

 **This is usually the spot where I have some questions that highlight small bits of foreshadowing I have in my story, but as I'm planning to upload the conclusion the same day I post this chapter, I really don't think that's necessary. Instead I'm going to explain why everyone is going to be treated to an extra chapter.**

 **Due to various things happening in my life, it's taken me almost a little over month to write what was originally going to be the last chapter. I already knew where I wanted to take this story, but as I wrote the page count just kept getting longer and longer. I'm fine with having an incredibly long chapter, but only if it is of a similar length to other chapters of the story. When I finished writing this chapter it was sitting at over forty pages, way too much. So I made the choice to split the chapter.**

 **Am I forgetting something? Oh right, the announcement. I'm going to have a little contest that spans all of my stories published so far. I'm not going to say that much about it, but I will give my readers of this story a little hint. In each of my stories I've hidden a little something, an Easter Egg if you will. For more details about this contest, please wait patiently until my next update of** _ **Son of the Sun**_ **or** _ **A New Realm**_ **.**

 **With all that said, here's acw28 saying, "until next update." (or until you hit that "next" button)**


	5. Growing Close and Not Letting Go

**I've updated twice today. If you haven't already go back and read the previous chapter. Thank you.**

 **So this is usually the spot where I either apologize for taking so long between updates, thank people for leaving reviews, get my readers excited for the chapter, or rant about something. Right now I don't think that's necessary since I'm uploading twice today, so I'll just get straight to the chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: I have run out of witty ways to say I don't own** _ **Star vs. The Forces of Evil**_ **.**

* * *

Queen Circe had a wonderful time last night showing off her newest jewels, she supposed she should thank her daughter for disappearing and creating such a wonderful opportunity. Not only that but she could also look forward to a wedding soon, which meant even more jewelry!

'And I know just the designs I want.' the Queen thought as she swam to her daughter's room. Knocking on the door, Circe said, "Jackie dear, it's time for you to get up, we have shopping to do." When she didn't get a response, she knocked again and asked, "Jackie?" When the room remained silent, the Queen opened the door, expecting her daughter to be sleeping in, however the room was empty and nothing out of place, except for the folded paper on the foot of the bed. The Queen quickly read it before releasing a great scream that awoke the entire kingdom.

King Mano was the first to get to the princess' room. Upon seeing his wife holding a piece of paper, the king asked, "What is the matter my Queen?"

"Someone…someone….someone…" try as she might, Queen Circe could not form a sentence between her sobbing. Growing tired of his wife's stuttering, the king grabbed the paper out of her hands. As it was protected by the bubble spell, it was still readable. On the outside were the words, "TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN." Inside was the simple message, "YOUR PRINCESS IS IN ANOTHER CASTLE!"

King Mano was angered by this, his daughter was what would grant him a larger army with minimal payment. Grabbing the nearest aid, he ordered, "Gather the council, we need to have a strategy meeting right now!" After his aid had swam off, King Mano realized his wife was still in tears, "Don't worry dear, we'll get her back."

The queen continued to sob but was able to form coherent sentences as she said, "Now I have to wait longer to order that new tiara for the wedding."

* * *

After turning off her alarm clock, Star stretched before getting off her bed and walking around her room as she said, "Good morning room, good morning wand, good morning Jackie-in-my-fish-tank, good morning clothes." Star suddenly realized what she said and rushed back out to her fish tank to find Jackie waving at her saying, "Good morning Star."

Once the princess' brain could once more function properly, she said, "Jackie! What are you doing here? Not that I don't want you here, but you weren't here when I went to bed and usually stuff doesn't appear in my room when I'm sleeping."

Star would have rambled on had Jackie not said, "Star it's fine. As for what I'm doing, I'm trying to decide whether to eat the breakfast Marco is making or to bite his hand off." Apparently she was still a little miffed at being in the tank.

Star was confused by the comment until Marco walked in carrying a plater with scrambled eggs, bacon, ham, waffles, sausages, and plates and said, "Good morning ladies." After dividing up the food and passing around the plates, the trio began eating. 'Okay, I guess the boy gets to keep his hand, for now.' Jackie thought as she savored her food.

As the group was eating, Marco noticed something and asked, "Hey Star, does your mirror usually blink in the mornings?"

As Marco had pointed out, Star's mirror was currently flashing a dull red. Seeing this, Star quickly got up and pressed one of the jewels on the mirror's frame, which caused a robotic voice to say, "You have…three calls…waiting. First call."

In an instant the mirror displayed a floating, blue unicorn head. "Hey B-fly, do you know why Earth Turd would be at St. O's late at night?"

Before Star could answer, Marco called out, "Come on Pony Head, I thought we were past that."

Said princess looked over Star's head to see Marco and Jackie continuing to enjoy their breakfast. "Dang! How did he manage to bag himself a mermaid? Have you two been partying without me?"

Before Star could answer, one of the guards came on screen and told the floating unicorn head, "Times up, you've been holding up the line. Your next opportunity for a mirror call is in two weeks."

After Pony Head's call ended, Tom appeared on the mirror. "Hey starship, I know you're still mad at me about the whole Blood Moon Ball thing, but I just found out something that I think you should know. I get that you're close to that human, Marco, but I saw him with a large sack earlier, I think he kidnapped a princess!"

Star didn't even look at Tom during her brief reply, "Don't call me that, still angry at you, already know about it and I'm cool with it." Before Tom could reply, Star ended the call.

The last call to appear on Star's mirror was from King Butterfly. "Star darling, do you know any reason why your friend would be in our dimension last night?"

"Uh…" not able to think of a convenient lie, Star just shifted her mirror to show Marco and Jackie eating breakfast. Upon seeing this, the king's eyes grew wide as he began saying, "Star, Marco, Jackie do you have any idea what cons…" however the call was cut off when a pixie appeared.

"I am sorry, but it appears you have run out of minutes."

"But I had enough for the rest of the month, and didn't I switch mirror providers?" Star asked.

"Your parents switched you back as our dimension provides the best deal. As for the minutes, three call waitings eat up a lot of time." Star grunted before she ended the call.

"Okay, well now that those are out of the way, we need to get ready for school." Here Star quickly shoved Marco out of the room before going into her closet, yelling out, "Hey Jackie you need to borrow some clothes?"

"Sorry Star, I'm stuck in this tank for the rest of the day, Marco said it's something about following the rules."

"Okay, see you later then."

As Star walked into the hallway she saw Marco waiting, full dressed but missing his back pack. Having an idea of what he was doing, Star asked, "You're not going to school today?"

Shaking his head, Marco replied, "It's possible Jackie and I can be tracked back to here. I have straight A's, so I figured I could take a sick day and just hang with Jackie."

Star nodded before walking towards the front door while saying, "Just be careful, who knows what her dad will send to get her back."

* * *

King Mano had just finished explaining the situation to his council. Understandably chaos soon began as everyone was blaming each other for allowing the princess to be kidnapped. While Mano would thrive in the chaos of battle, the chaos of bureaucracy just gave him a headache. Finally he had enough and yelled, "I demand silence!" Instantly the room was quiet, "Now we will find out who is at fault after she is safely back here. Now does anyone have any ideas on how to find her?"

The room was silent until a voice in the back said, "Why don't you allow me to find her?" The crowd parted to reveal the hammerhead Jackie was engaged to, Mano though his name was Fang. King Mano was about to tell him this wasn't child's play, but the young shark continued, "You have been very gracious to me and my people by allowing me to marry your daughter, why not let me earn the honor?"

"Fine," King Mano finally said after a minute considering his options, "take five of my men and search for my daughter while the rest of us figure out a more reliable answer."

With a bow Fang left the council room. After gathering his men, he began his search in the princess' room. With his eyes closed, he slowly turned his head back and forth. Seeing this, one of the guards whispered to the other, "What do you think he's doing?"

"Will you be quite!" Fang snapped, "I need to concentrate for this!" While all shark-people could sense electrical pulses to an extent, with their wider heads and more surface area hammerhead shark-people were more adapt at this and with a little magic could sense the past electrical pulses and follow a trail as long as it wasn't too old. Once he had enough focus, Fang could "see" a figure with two legs standing at the window and a figure with a tail hovering over their back. Having the trail, Fang turned to his men and motioned them to follow.

Soon the shark-people were at portal canyon. "Well that's it then," one of the shark-soldiers said, "that portal is random, not telling where they went."

"And you are a fool," Fang replied, "the trail goes past the portal, somehow the kidnapper made it past and opened a different portal. We must move quickly if we are to catch the culprit."

And more quickly they did, however while Fang and four of the guards made it past the portal, the last wasn't so lucky, but was somehow able to swim out of the portals pull. Once Fang and the remaining guards regrouped, the hammerhead yelled, "Well what are we waiting for, we have a princess to save!" and used his claws to reopen Marco's portal.

While the men gave a battle cry as they entered the portal, that stopped when they realized they were in Quest Buy. Unfortunately the multitude of people and electronics would cause interference tracking the assailant's "shadow". Fang expressed this frustration by pinching his brow and saying, "This is going to take awhile."

* * *

Star walked out of third period think how weird the day had been so far. When she first arrived at school, it seemed like almost all of the male students were waiting for Marco to step off the bus, only to release a groan when they found out through Star that Marco was "sick" that day. Of course when it became known that Jackie was also "sick" the rumor mill began to turn. Star did wonder what state the pair would have to run away to get married in, they were only 14!

Star was lost in her thoughts as she walked to her next class, only to be broken from them when Janna snuck up behind the girl and said, "So I guess Marco's plan is working."

Star shrugged her shoulders as she said, "I guess, he keeps going on about how he needs to follow the rules of something, but doesn't tell me or you know who anything."

Janna nodded her head before breaking out into a huge grin. When questioned by Star, the girl just said, "I'm imagining their reaction to the rest of that law."

Star raised an eyebrow as she asked, "What law?"

"Nope, not telling." Janna said before she started running away.

"Well that was weird." Star said to herself before she went into the classroom.

* * *

"You really started skateboarding a week after you got your legs?" Marco asked. He and Jackie were just ideally chatting with each other. They may have a connection, but they still didn't actually know that much about each other.

Jackie nodded her head as she leaned out of the tank. "Well of course I did, back then it was the only solid lead I had on you. I did get a few scraps and bruises and I didn't always do the best I could, I did run into you during seventh grade, but at least I never broke any bones like someone."

"I may have broken my arm twice doing karate, but my only skateboarding injury is my head."

"But on the tape me and Star saw you with a cast."

"Yeah," Marco scratched the back of his neck as recounted how he broke his arm the first time. "I had just broken my first board that day and when I got home I made myself a deal that if I could do it again then I would ask you to hang out. You can guess how that turned out."

* * *

It took Fang longer than he would like to admit to track the "shadow" to the next portal. He had gotten through the hall of traps unscratched, but the same could not be said for all of his men. "Now is everyone alright?"

"I got one of my fins chopped off!"

"Well put it on ice and we'll either reattach it or eat it later. Right now we have a job to do." Opening the next portal, the group were transported to the giant treadmill leading to Saint Olga's. However, Fang declined to listen to the guard and just opened the next portal. As soon as the group set foot in Tom's dimension, they started hopping due to the hot ground. Somehow the shark-men managed to move forward until Tom caught sight of them.

"Quickly!" the demon yelled, "The guy that took your princess should be through the next portal!" He still wanted revenge against Marco as Star hadn't reacted like he'd expected her to. Tom figured Marco had went directly back to Earth and while he couldn't currently go there to take his revenge directly, he could direct others.

With renewed vigor, Fang lead the soldiers through the portal and into Ludo's dimension. Seeing the tiny tyrant rallying his minions to launch another attack against Star, Fang cried out, "For the princess!" as he and his men began attacking Ludo's army.

* * *

Star now realized how boring school could be without Marco to distract her or Ludo to fight. She had briefly run into Ferguson and Alfonzo who feared Marco had perished during another Bro Code. Luckily Star was able to calm their fears but refused to tell them where Marco was. As the magical princess from another dimension walked to her next class, Star realized that Marco's parents would be home tonight, and they didn't know anything about Jackie being a mermaid or Marco's rescue.

'Okay, I've got to get home so we can come up with a plan.' Star thought to herself.

* * *

"Seriously though, trying to stop Star with a volleyball net while she was going through Mewberty, that was stupid." Jackie said as she laughed, she had been sick that day and only got some of the details from Janna.

"Hey I didn't know Mewni biology and Glossarcyk wasn't much help." Marco said, defending his actions. As a new thought popped into his head, Marco asked, "I'm not going to have to worry about anything like that with you will I?"

Jackie thought for a second before she said, "I might get a little possessive at times and you probably want to keep rare meat away from me."

"Feeding frenzy?" Marco asked.

"Feeding frenzy." Jackie confirmed.

* * *

It was a long and glorious battle between the five shark-men and Ludo's minions. After many hours, both sides were scrapped, bleeding, but somehow no one was dead. As the battle drew to a close, Fang crawled toward Ludo as he commanded, "We have defeated you, now release our princess.'

"What are you talking about?" Ludo asked.

"Our mermaid princess that you kidnapped, the demon kid told us she was here!" Fang yelled.

"Why would I kidnap a mermaid?!" Ludo screamed as he threw his hands up. "They have some magic yes, but it's all internal. I would never be able to harvest it!"

"Then where is our princess!"

"Perhaps I could shed some light on the situation." From seemingly out of nowhere, a tall, bipedal, suit wearing, alligator with a missing finger spoke. (A/N This guy is in the running of being my favorite character of the show.)

"Toffee!" Luco immediately sprung up to his feet. "Are you here to finish these guys off?"

"No, I am here to clear up this unfortunate debacle." Turning to Fang, Toffee said, "I believe you were misinformed, if your kidnapper could travel between dimensions, he obviously would go through as many as possible to stall any pursuers. He would most likely wait until he was in a safe place to open another portal, try the other side of Mewni."

Fang nodded his thanks as he and his men limped toward Mewni's dark forest. They had walked for perhaps ten minutes before they were surrounded by a group of knights and spearmen led by King Butterfly. "An armed group of shark-men has appeared in not only my dimension, but also my kingdom! This appears to be an invasion, this is grounds for war!" the king shouted, the shark-men didn't need to know that he knew of Jackie's kidnapping.

"Wait, please, this is a simple misunderstanding. We are only trying to retrieve our kidnapped princess, we believe she was transported thought this dimension." Fang pleaded.

"Then have your guards return home and only your leader continue onward." While it may appear that King Butterfly was helping Marco, something he couldn't do or risk his kingdom going to war, he was actually insuring the law was followed. The king had a good idea what Marco had done (even if he doesn't condone it), but also knew that Fang was violating the rules by having an armed entourage.

Fang reluctantly asked the king to provide a portal home for the guards while he continued on the quest alone. He soon came to where the "shadows" ended and opened up another portal.

* * *

Olaf had dragged Elsa, the ruler of the kingdom, her sister Anna, and Anna's boyfriend Kristoff, into the town's center where he had met Marco.

"Could you go over this again Olaf?" Elsa asked.

"Okay," the happy snowman said, "I was walking in the town square and Marco and his moving sack appeared and ran into that house."

Kristoff whispered to Anna, "Are we sure his brain hasn't melted?" only to be lightly slapped and told, "Oh hush you." by his girlfriend.

"Well that was certainly…interesting." Elsa said, use to Olaf's friendly attitude, although there would be some concern if what the snowman had said about a moving sack was true, someone could have been kidnapped. "I'll look into this Marco, but for now let's go home."

However before the group left, Fang suddenly appeared in the town's square, stopping just short of the wall Marco had run into earlier. He then turned and reopened another portal, all while never noticing the group. Once he left, Elsa stated, "Kristoff, I think we need to go talk to the trolls."

* * *

When Fang exited the portal, he almost fell off the roof, however his quick reflexes stopped him. Although it was difficult, Fang could see the "shadow" reappear on the street and run into an ally. After carefully climbing down, Fang ran in delayed pursuit.

Tony Stark, aka Iron Man, was currently standing in front of the ally where Marco had disappeared. He was in civilian clothes as he explained what happened to his skeptical friends, well those that weren't called off to save the world.

"Let me get this straight," Steve Rogers, aka Captain America, began, "you rescued a kid from falling off a roof, then heard a voice from his bag, then he skate boarded, which I still don't know what that is, down this ally and disappeared with a pair of scissors?"

"Yes!" Tony practically screamed. "We stopped an interstellar invasion once, defeated a robot that was smarter than me, what part of this doesn't make sense?"

"I don't know Stark," Natasha Romanoff, aka Black Widow, began, "I got to go with Cap. on this one, it just doesn't seem possible."

Just as Natasha finished speaking, the group saw Fang in the ally. Steven and Natasha got ready to engage while Tony had a suit on standby, however none of this was necessary as the hammerhead shark-man stopped just short of the group and reopened a portal. A stunned silence fell on the group until Tony smirked and asked, "Believe me now?"

"Don't want to hear it Stark, let's just find Thor and see if we can get him away from Jane for five seconds, maybe he knows what's going on."

* * *

After all he had been through that day, Fang had expected to be launched into the middle of a battle when he stepped through the next portal, however he instead found himself in a peaceful backyard. He noticed four kids working on some contraption with a multitude of mirrors and crystals while another was busy working out a mathematical equation on a chalkboard. Not have the patience for this, Fang quickly found the exit portal and reopened it.

After the portal closed, Phineas put his head and asked, "Did anyone else feel like we just missed something?" only to be answered by a chorus of no's. After tightening down a few screws and checking the wiring, Phineas declared, "There, our dimensional refractor is finished."

"What does this thing do again?" Buford asked.

"Phineas explained it the first time Buford," Isabella began, "we shine light through the crystals, which in turn is shone on the mirror, which redirects it back on the crystals which will superheat and open a portal to a different dimension once it reaches a certain heat."

"Huh?" the bully asked.

"Crystals gets hot, portal opens." Ferb said.

"And I just figured out what temperature we need to go to the dimension where the portals end." Baljeet proudly declared.

"Okay then," Phineas started, "Let's get lunch then see if this thing works."

* * *

Fang was actually having a peaceful time when the portal opened in the woods. He was curious why the princess' "shadow" seemed to willingly go with her abductor, but that was a question for another time. The hammerhead shark-man became so used to the relaxing dimensions that the big city of San Fransokyo proved to be quite a shock. However, he was determine to prove himself and once more set off after the "shadows".

"Are you sure you weren't seeing things?" Honey Lemon asked in a concern voice. She along with Wasabi, GoGo, and Fred had gathered at the ally where Hiro claimed to see the other teen, Marco, disappear.

"I'm sure Honey Lemon. One second I'm talking to him, then Baymax tells me he has something that doesn't match any of his records, and the next second the guy vanishes."

"So you didn't see him disappear." GoGo stated.

"Well, no, but Baymax recorded it. Show them buddy."

As the group gathered in front of the robot to see the recorded footage, Fang walked into the ally. Fred was the only one to see him approach as everyone else was looking at the footage. After several attempts to gather their attention, Fred finally just grabbed Wasbi's head and pointed it at the hammerhead shark-man as Fang reopened the portal and stepped through. "Did anyone else see that or was it just me and Fred?"

After being told no, Wasabi walked over to the wall and muttered to himself, "How can I get you to reopen?"

Fred however heard him and said, "Wait, I know the answer to this one, it's just like in Commander Mantis issue 12!"

* * *

Fang hoped that he was getting close to the end of his quest as he walked the halls of Norrisville High. So focused on his task was he that he did not notice the looks of terror the students where giving him, or others running away once he was out of sight. While most students ran out of the building like they were instructed to do during the "Monster Drill," a chubby red head, Howard, ran to find his best friend. As luck would have it, said friend was right around the corner.

"Cunningham, we've got another person stanked! Must be a newbie, never seen someone turn into a shark." When his friend still wouldn't move, Howard gave him a shove as he said, "Well, what are you waiting for, I can believe I'm going to say this but, it's Ninja-o'clock!"

"Wait, Randy's the Ninja?" It was only now that Howard realized that Randy had been talking to his new girlfriend.

After briefly glaring at Howard, Randy turned to Theresa and said, "Yes I'm the Ninja. I promise I'll tell you more later, but I'm needed right now, okay?"

Theresa nodded and said, "Okay, but you're taking me to the movies this weekend." before she walked off. Randy wondered how he got such a great girlfriend before putting on the Ninja mask, having the suit spread outward. Once he was ready, Randy dropped a smoke bomb, appearing in front of Fang a second later. "Wow, it is a new monster, I expected Bucky to be stanked again before this happened. So what's your story? Exchange student being bullied by Bash?"

Fang growled before he answered, "I don't have time for this." As the hammerhead shark-man began to turn around, he was stopped when something red wrapped itself around his arm.

"Wow, you can actually talk in complete sentences. Are you really stanked, or are you one of Viceroy's pets?" Randy asked.

"You will pay for your insolence!" Fang then charged and tried to deliver a haymaker, only for Randy to dodge and retaliate with three fast hits to Fang's torso and face. The pain disorientated Fang slightly, but once he recovered he realized he was next to the portal opening. "Be thankful I have bigger fish to catch or else I would stay to finish you!" Fang declared before he ripped open the portal and stepped through.

"Did he just make a fishing reference?" Randy asked. Not waiting for an answer, Randy smoke bombed away so a deserted room to remove the mask.

* * *

Fang stepped out of the portal in front of the gym. While he was able to escape the fight with the ninja relatively unscratched, the last hit did cause a large amount of pain to his nose. Due to the pain, Fang was unable to concentrate enough to see the "shadows", coupled with the electricity in the air due to the telephone wires meant that Fang could not effectively tack. 'Well I have to start somewhere.' Fang thought to himself as he walked away, in the opposite direction of the Diaz house.

* * *

Star had to stay afterschool to serve detention as Principal Skeeves finally went back and watched the tape from when the mystery meat came to life. As Star didn't have enough money to bribe the greedy man, she was forces to spend two hours clapping erasers without magic. Once she was finished she had to walk home as the last bus had already left. Needless to say, Star was exhausted when she managed to climb the stairs to her room, only to see that Marco and Jackie had grown very close during her absence. The mermaid girl was currently leaning out of her tank, making out with the boy. After a minute of not being noticed, Star gave a sharp cough, which caused both teens to quickly separate, each having massive blushes.

"Hey Star, thought you would be home earlier." Marco said as he scratched the back of his head.

"Yeah, well Skeeves found out I was the one that brought the lunch meat to life so I had detention. How about you two, seems like you got close."

Jackie's blush grew darker as she said, "You could say that."

Although she found the entire event amusing, Star decided to bring up the real issue. "Hey Marco, do your parents know that you've kidnapped a mermaid?"

Marco went deathly pale as he said, "No, I guess I forgot to send them a text or a note or something."

"So what, I'll just have to hide for a while, right?" Jackie asked.

"Except Marco's parents have the best luck at finding things. I had a pack of jerky stashed under my bed once and Mr. Diaz found it within five minutes." Star declared.

"And it's not just finding things." Marco added. "I once busted a window at school, no one saw me do it. My mom knew about it before she even picked me up."

"Okay, so if I did hide your parents would think something's up and find me." Jackie said, then added, "So we just have to hide something else to throw off suspicion."

"Hey Marco, what were the exact rules of that law you're using?" Star asked.

"That the captured princess must remain within a castle of your residence in your home dimension. Why do you ask?"

Both princesses stared at the boy with wide eyes until Jackie screamed, "Are you kidding me!?"

"What?"

"Marco," Star began, "was there anything saying Jackie had to stay like she is?"

Seeing where his mistake was, Marco swallowed the lump in his throat before saying, "I kind of assumed that part."

Before anyone could respond, Star caught a glimpse through her window of of the Diaz car driving toward the house. "We don't have time for this," she said as she pushed Marco out of her room, "wait out here while I help Jackie!"

Marco waited in the hall as instructed, but was too nervous about what his parents' reaction would be to stand still. Marco's parents generally trusted their son to do the right thing on his own, thus the only real rule in the house was no skateboarding. Still, he didn't expect his mom and dad to be alright with him kidnapping someone, even if they didn't want to be where they were. As he heard his parent's car pull into the driveway, Star suddenly opened her door and said, "Make it look good," before he was pulled into the room as Star left it.

Marco saw that Jackie was finishing getting dressed. She was currently wearing a pair of black skinny jeans, a pair of dark green converse, and was halfway done buttoning up a similarly colored shirt, her seashell bra still visible. While she struggled, Jackie asked, "Is there anything else?" A quick look of the room revealed Marco's helmet and skateboard sitting on the floor in plain view. Marco kicked them under Star's bed, however some water left on the floor from when Jackie exited the tank caused him to slip. In his attempt to keep upright, Marco brought Jackie down to the floor with him.

* * *

"Hi Mr. and Mrs. Diaz, did you have a nice trip?" Star asked as she greeted the two down stairs.

"It was alright Star, but it's nice to be home." Mr. Diaz said. Mrs. Diaz, however, had not lost the strange look on her face since she had entered the house. It looked as if she was contemplating something before she suddenly became rigid and made a declaration.

"You and Marco are hiding something."

"What? Now that's just silly. What could Marco and I possibly have to hide?" Star asked as innocently as she could. The two adults seemed like they would believe it, had it not been for the loud thud seconds later. After sharing a look, Mr. and Mrs. Diaz started going upstairs. As they were approaching Star's room, the princess yelled, "Wait! Don't open the door!" However, her warning was not taken. Once the door was fully open, the trio were greeted to a shocking sight.

Marco was lying flat on the floor, Jackie straddling his waist. In the course of the fall, their lips had landed against each other. Heading Star's words, Jackie decided to, "make it look good," and snuck her tongue into Marco's mouth. Marco was at first shocked, but soon followed her lead, noting some of the girl's molars had turned sharp.

After a minute, Mrs. Diaz coughed lightly to get the two teens attention and asked, "Hello Marco, who is your friend?"

"Right, mom, dad, meet Jackie. Jackie, mom and dad."

"Hi Mr. and Mrs. Diaz." Jackie greeted as she removed herself from Marco and once more attempted to completely button her borrowed shirt.

"Nice to meet you dear." Mrs. Diaz said before turning to Marco and asking, "And will Jackie be staying for dinner?"

Marco was going to think of a response, but Star replied first by saying, "She kind of has to. We got assigned a group project in History and the teacher wants a bunch of work done before next Wednesday. We're probably going to have to have dinner in my room and work while we eat."

Mrs. Diaz nodded her head and said, "Well it's getting late, my Husband and I will get dinner made while you three work. Coming dear?"

"In a second honey." Mr. Diaz replied. Once his wife was gone, the man turned to the three teenagers and said, "This door stays open." before he left. The room was silent for a moment until all three teens started laughing hysterically.

Once he was able to talk Marco said, "I can't believe that worked. Good idea with the History project Star."

"Um, that wasn't a lie." Star said as she began to say, "We got assigned a project on the founding of Echo Creek when it was a gold town. The teacher wants a timeline, outline, five primary sources, three secondary sources, and at least one visual aid before next Wednesday, I think." Star said. Once she saw the questioning looks from her project partners, Star started walking out of the room saying, "Or I might have read it wrong, let me grab the requirements."

Once Star left, Jackie turned to Marco and asked, "Can I borrow your phone? I should probably get Janna and her mom in the loop so I can stay the night."

"Sure." After surrendering his phone, Marco asked, "Was the tongue really necessary?"

Jackie tried to hide her smile as she countered, "You weren't complaining about it earlier."

Marco blushed slightly as he asked, "And your teeth?"

"I got a little excited, sue me."

* * *

"It's no problem Miss Thomas, she's welcome to stay the night. Have a nice trip." Mrs. Diaz said before she hung up the phone.

"Who was that dear?" Mr. Diaz asked as he put the leftovers in the fridge.

"That was Jackie's aunt. Apparently she had to leave for a business trip this afternoon and would rather Jackie doesn't walk home by herself."

Mr. Diaz simply shrugged his shoulders before saying, "As long as Marco and her niece don't sleep in the same room I don't see a problem."

"What is the matter with you lately? You know our son, he would never do something like that with a girl he hardly knows."

"I know dear." Mr. Diaz reassured his wife. "It's just that I feel like there's something different with him and until I figure it out I don't want to take chances."

Knowing what her husband feared, Mrs. Diaz put a reassuring hand on his arm as she said, "You're a good father, but you worry too much. For crying out loud, he's been called the "Safety Kid" ever since the seventh grade. Now come on, let's see what has been has been happening since we left."

As Mrs. Diaz turned the TV on to the local news, the anchor said, "Repeating our top story, a bipedal hammerhead shark has been reported rampaging through out Echo Creek. Sightings are unconfirmed but citizens are urged to stay indoors."

The two adults were silent for a moment before Mr. Diaz called upstairs. "Star?"

"Yes?"

"Have you created any shark-men recently?"

"Not to my knowledge."

"Okay dear, just be sure to keep all your magical creations inside the house." Mrs. Diaz said.

Upstairs Marco and Jackie were having a conversation of their own. "So one of your dad's soldiers was able to track us." Marco said as he assessed the situation.

"I'd guess it'd be Fang so he could prove his worth to me as a husband." Jackie said before growing serious. "What happens if he finds me here Marco?"

"We'll worry about that problem when it presents itself." Marco answered. "I'm guessing the guy is probably around our age so he shouldn't be that difficult to fight. And we have your necklace." Looking at the clock and seeing it was past ten, Marco gave Jackie a quick kiss before saying, "Well I better get to bed. Don't worry about Fang, when you wake up tomorrow it'll all be over."

* * *

Jackie was in the middle of a nightmare. She dreamt that Marco's "rescue" had never happened, that she was going to be married to Fang, that she was forced to watch as her father and new husband waged an unnecessary war, enslaving countless societies just so merpeople and shark-people did not have to do any work. Worst of all, she dreamt of having kid's that wanted to follow their grandfather's example. After what seemed like an eternity in this nightmare, Jackie woke up screaming, only then did she notice her fins and tail. It appeared that in the course of her tossing and turning her necklace had managed to slip off. After throwing a pillow to wake up her roommate, Jackie asked, "Do you think I could borrow another pair of pajama pants, these got a little ruined." before she slipped her necklace back on. Star tiredly nodded her head before going back into her closet.

* * *

Halfway across town, Fang was getting tired with his search. He had believed he found the princess several times, only for him to grab several terrified ladies, and in once case a man, before he threw them away in annoyance. Just as the prince was about to scream in frustration, he caught a small whiff of a scent. To many it would be unrecognizable, but to natives of his dimension it was immediately recognizable. While it only lasted for a second, the scent pointed him in the right way. Smirking, Fang ran to claim his prize.

* * *

"What happened, who was screaming?" Marco asked as he ran into Star's room.

"Relax Marco, I just had a nightmare." Jackie reassured the boy.

Growing concerned, Marco asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"Only that this was a dream and I was still trapped in the nightmare."

Marco placed a comforting arm around Jackie's shoulder's as he said, "I promise, I'm not going to let that happen." Hearing this, Jackie smiled before she started leaning towards Marco. However before anything could happen, the girl was hit by a pillow.

"Get a room you two, just not mine." Star said from her bed. Both teens were silent for a moment before they started laughing.

Once Marco was able to compose himself, he said, "I should probably get back to my room."

"Do you have to?" Jackie asked with a small pout.

"There's no telling what my parents would do if they knew I was here." Marco then noticed the time as he got up. "I'm expecting a phone call anyway."

"At this time?" Jackie asked. "It's related to the rules you're following isn't it?"

Marco smiled as he walked out of the room and said, "I'll tell you in the morning."

* * *

It was half an hour after Marco left Star's room that Fang climbed in through the window. He was confused why he was able to follow the scent back to this house when he first saw Star, but then he saw Jackie. Although she was still disguised, Fang was able to see the similarities between the girl and the kidnapped princess. Seeing the seashell necklace, and having some knowledge of magic because of his family, the hammerhead shark-man quickly pulled the necklace off of Jackie, revealing her mermaid features. Smirking to himself, Fang threw Jackie over his shoulder as he made his way to the window.

However, this sudden action awoke Jackie. After screaming in fright and hitting her "rescuer", Jackie saw Star move out of the corner of her eye as Fang prepared to jump out the window. "Quick," Jackie told her friend, "get Marco!"

Not even a second after Fang and Jackie were gone and Marco was already in the room asking, "One of the shark-men found her?" When Star nodded her head, Marco dove under her bed to retrieve his helmet and skateboard. Star saw that Marco was about to jump out of the opposite window, onto the roof and asked, "Can't you just use the door?"

Marco shook his head as head said, "I've lost her once, I'm not about to let it happen a second time." He then jumped out the window, got his board under his feet, rode it down the roof, and jumped to the ground before speeding off.

This action understandably created a lot of noise within the house. Unlike Star, both Mr. and Mrs. Diaz were light sleepers. Curious as to what caused the loud thud followed by the scrapping sound, both adults quickly moved to the front door in time to see Marco skating after Fang and Jackie.

"It that Marco, on a skateboard?" Mrs. Diaz slowly asked.

Mr. Diaz could barely contain his anger as he said, "That boy is in so much trouble."

* * *

Fang was elated. Despite the setbacks of losing his armed escort, having his tracking abilities become next to useless, and the princess currently hitting his back, he had almost completed his mission. As soon as he stepped back into the ocean he could open a portal home where he'd be hailed as a hero.

Yet this was not to be, just fifty feet from the water's edge, Marco came soaring over the hammerhead shark-man. After jumping from a nearby elevated parking lot, Marco's board slipped as it lost traction in the sand, however the boy was able to quickly step off his board and quickly launched a round house kick.

The blow connected, causing Fang to lose his grip on Jackie, but the momentum caused the mermaid to roll until she was perhaps a foot from the water. Marco offered the girl a quick apology while Fang yelled out, "Well what are you waiting for? Get in the water!"

Instead of moving, Jackie propped herself up by her elbows and said, "Actually, I think I'll stick around and see how this plays out."

Fang snarled as he said, "You stupid girl." as he began to charge, only to be stopped as Marco caught his weirdly shaped head in his hands and said, "I think she's smart enough to know what she wants for herself."

Both combatants growled as they were deadlocked. This changed when the semi-silence of the tense atmosphere was broken. "Space unicorn, soaring through the stars." After hearing the ringtone, Jackie immediately started laughing as she asked, "Seriously Marco?"

"It's supposed to be ironic." The boy answered before launching a heavy punch to Fang's nose, disorientating the hammerhead long enough for Marco to answer his phone. "Hello? Yes speaking. Okay, yes as soon as possible." As soon as Marco ended the call, one of the guards from Saint Olga's opened a portal.

"Sorry about that, we had to deal with a massive rush of paperwork and no one was able to check your timer for the past half hour." Marco waved off the man's concern and was about to reply when everyone present heard a cry of, "Rainbow transit beam." After a flash of light, everyone now saw Star standing on the beach, her wand ready to be unleashed.

"Calm down Star, everything's over." Marco said.

"Really?" Jackie asked.

"Yes it is," the guard said before reaching into his jacket, "as soon as we finish this paperwork. Now please sign here, initial here, mother's maiden name here, blood type here, dimension of residence here, and sign here." Once Marco finished all of the signing the guard went over to Jackie and asked her to sign in two different boxes, then asked Fang to sign in one spot.

As the hammerhead shark-man finished, he asked, "Now may I take my betrothed home?"

"She is no longer yours." The guard said. "Mr. Diaz here applied for a class 1985 permit, more commonly known as a "princess kidnapping license." His application was reviewed and accepted. As of 11:03 P.M. tonight, Marco has had Jackie in his castle for a period exciding 24 hours, thereby successfully kidnapping her. As he has completed the objectives detailed in the law, and as you have signed this, then you and all parties connected to you have given up any claim on Princess Jackie."

Fang's jaw hit the ground before he asked, "It there anyway for me to overturn this?"

"You could file a protest, but given that Marco followed all the proper channels and that Jackie did not want to be in her home dimension, any action to overturn this will be for not." Seeing the anger in Fang's eyes the guard continued by saying, "I also highly recommend you do not act violently to the outcome of these events or there will be consequences that are much worse than what King Mano could come up with." After a minute, Fang accepted defeat and walked into the ocean. The guard turned to leave as well, but stopped and asked, "So that I don't need to make a return visit, what is the minimum age for marriage where you reside?"

"Eighteen, why?" Marco asked.

Instead of answering the boy, the guard nodded and said, "Then congratulations four years in advance." then returned to his own dimension.

"Well that was weird." Jackie stated. Marco was about to reply, only for a piece of red fabric to wrap around his arm and pull him away before what looked like a large round metal shield with a star in the center impacted where he was previously standing.

"Guess we're even know." Randy said as he settled into a combat stance to help defend his interdimensional friend. Standing across from the two boys were Tony Stark, Steven Rodgers, and Natasha Romanoff, each one suited up and ready to fight.

Tony moved first, launch a repulse blast at the boys, only to have it deflected as a large mound of ice appeared out of thin air.

"Hi Marco, where's your moving sack?" Olaf asked as he stood next to Elsa.

While the commotion was happening on one end of the beach, two more portals opened close to Jackie. Out of one stepped five children who were simply awestruck at the event surrounding them. Out of the other stepped three children, two immediately rushed off and started to try to get Jackie into the ocean while the third just observed the scene.

"Could you please stop, I'd actually like to stay here." Jackie said.

"But we're trying to rescue you from your kidnapper!" Dipper Pines exclaimed.

"Don't worry we'll have you out of here in a jiffy." Mabel Pines, his twin, added before asking, "Do you know Mermando?"

"Sorry kid, wrong dimension." Jackie responded.

Before things could escalate even more out of hand, another portal opened between both groups. "I can't believe that worked." Wasabi said.

"See, I told you!" Fred exclaimed, proud of himself. "All we had to do was revere the charge of the portal ions and it would link us to the dimension where the last portal was opened." Looking around and seeing Tony in his suit, Fred pointed to the man and said, "He knows what I'm talking about."

Seeing the questioning looks from just about everyone, Tony sighed before he said, "The guy's right."

When Hiro slipped past his group and saw Marco and Jackie, he mumbled to himself, "That actually explains a lot."

Before anymore fighting could be resumed, Star gained everyone's attention by yelling, "Hey! Could someone tell me what is going on?!"

"Well I had my family of trolls open a portal after me, my girlfriend, her sister, and our magic snowman friend saw a shark-man walk through our village and we wanted to make sure he wouldn't cause any problems. But as soon as we get here we see these two boys getting attack." Kristoff explained.

"Well one of them isn't exactly innocent." Tony spoke up to defend his actions. "I saved the brat from falling to his death then hear a voice from his bag saying she wasn't going to get Stockholm syndrome."

"We just wanted to make sure everyone was okay." Phineas said for his group.

"I tried to make those two just let it go, but they insisted on coming to rescue the mermaid. " Pacifica said.

"We were just curious how Hiro's new friend suddenly vanished and what he had that didn't match anything Baymax had on file." GoGo quickly said.

"I came to thank this dude for helping me get with the brucest girl and saw he could use some help." Randy explained.

Marco began to rub his temples as he asked, "We've got a lot of explaining to do don't we?" Jackie only nodded, feelingly like she was in for a long night.

* * *

20 minutes of explaining later.

"So you did kidnapper her, but only because you knew she wouldn't want to stay in her own dimension and wouldn't be treated well?" Tony asked.

"For the last time yes!" Marco yelled, the supposed genius was incredibly thick skulled. "Now do we have any more questions?"

While no one responded after a few minutes, everyone was in silent agreement that the situation had taken care of itself.

"Well if that's it then we should get back, Fury is going to want a report on this." Steve said before Tony nodded and started activating a portal.

"Yeah, we should leave too, Gruncle Stan might actually get slightly worried. Bye Star, thanks for the sweater ideas." Mable waved goodbye as her twin started drawing a series of symbols in the sand while Pacifica helped him.

"We should get back as well, a kingdom does not run itself." Elsa said as Anna pulled out some strange charm.

"Well it was nice meeting everyone." Ferb said as Phineas started messing with a remote-control like device.

"Wish we could stay and chat longer, but some villain's probably popped up back home. Come visit sometime." Hiro said as Wasabi and Honey Lemon started tinkering with a return pad.

"Well, thanks for everything. Ever feel like sparing stop by my dimension some time." Randy said before going through some hand movements.

After all of the portals were opened and everyone had returned to their dimension, the only occupants of the beach were Marco, Star, and Jackie.

"Well, it's certainly been some day hasn't it?" Marco asked.

"I'll say." Jackie replied before asking, "I wonder why the guy from Saint O's needed to know when people could get married."

"Let's see." Star said as she used her wand to summon the interdimensional law book. "Here we are. Capture of princess, relocation to home dimension, kept in captivity for at least 24 hours in a castle, notice of kidnapping, wed upon completion of kidnapping and when legally allowed, loss of responsibility for home dimension."

"Wait, what was that second to last one?" Jackie asked with wide eyes.

Star looked over that section of the law once more, before laughing awkwardly and scratching the back of her head. Marco was the first to recover and said, "So does that mean…"

Before the boy could finish his question, the groups attention was captured by the sounds of squealing tires. In the parking lot, Mr. and Mrs. Diaz exited their car, with Mr. Diaz marching towards Marco with a purpose. Grabbing his son by the arm, Mr. Diaz dragged Marco further down the beach.

"Hello Star, Jackie," Mrs. Diaz greeted the girls, unfazed by Jackie's mermaid features as she had lived with Star long enough, "I can see that you had an eventfully night. Jackie I know that we said you could spend the night, but due to some of Marco's actions it'd probably be best if you stayed with another friend."

Jackie nodded her head as she said, "I understand, can I borrow a phone to make sure someone's spare bed is available?" After Mrs. Diaz lent Jackie her phone so that she could text Janna and make sure the back door was unlocked, Jackie nodded towards the direction Marco and Mr. Diaz went and asked, "Marco's not going to be in too much trouble is he?"

"I really don't know dear, the last time he rode a skateboard he ended up getting hurt really bad. I guess me and my husband overreacted with the rule just a bit, but we just didn't want to see our boy hurt again."

* * *

"The one rule we have for you and you break it. I don't know what is in your head Marco Diaz, do you want to go brain dead?" Mr. Diaz lectured his son.

After listening for the past few minutes, Marco finally saw an opportunity to tell his side. "No Dad, I don't want to be brain dead, that's why I wear a helmet. Yes I didn't wear one all those years ago, and I was an idiot for doing so. But you know what, after spending years being afraid, I actually got on a skateboard and enjoyed myself. I know I might get hurt, but how often did you burn yourself when you first started using a blow torch, how often have you hit your hand because the chisel slipped?" After taking a moment to let his questions sink in, Marco continued, "Dad, you can make all the rules you want, but I'm not going to stop skateboarding, just know that I'm going to be safe about it and wear my helmet."

Mr. Diaz was silent for what seemed like an eternity before saying, "The first time you ride without your helmet I'm sending you to live with your Grandmother." After running a hand down his face, Mr. Diaz continued by saying, "It's been a long night and you have school tomorrow. Let's grab the girls and get out of here."

After walking back to the rest of the group, Mr. Diaz asked Jackie if she needed a ride somewhere.

"No thanks, my friend's house is close by. She already knows about everything so I'll just swim."

"But what about the shark-people?" Star asked.

"Thanks to Marco they shouldn't be a problem." Turning to the boy, Jackie had a slight blush as she remembered one particular point of the law before she said, "I'll see you tomorrow." and pushed herself into the ocean. Once the Diaz family and Star were sure that Jackie was in the clear, they all piled into the family car and drove home.

* * *

"Come on Marco it's time to get ready, it's Friday so the sooner we get to school the sooner it gets over!" Star yelled from Marco's door.

As he got up Marco told the princess, "It doesn't work like that Star, and we still need to wait for the bus." After he was finished getting dressed and was pulling out one of his hoodies, he heard a rock hit his window. Looking out onto the street, Marco saw Jackie waiting for him with her skateboard. After hurrying down the stairs and grabbing a piece of toast from the kitchen, Marco grabbed his own skateboard as he called out to Star, "Actually I'm going to go a bit early, see ya later Star."

Marco and Jackie skated in silence for ten minutes until Marco couldn't handle it and said, "Listen, I'm sorry about the marriage thing. I swear I didn't know about it when I applied for the kidnapping license."

"I'm not mad Marco." Jackie cut the boy off before he could say anything else.

"You're not?" After a moment of silence Marco asked, "So where do we go from here?"

"The way I see it," Jackie began, "you saved me from having to marry someone I would never even think about and got me out of a place I didn't want to live. So here's what we'll do, we have four years until the marriage becomes official, so let's date and if it doesn't feel right I can always "escape from my captor."

"You know, that doesn't sound half bad." Marco said before he noticed Jackie slightly shiver. It was getting to the colder months of the year and being the gentlemen that he is, Marco quickly took off his hoodie and offered it to his new girlfriend.

"Thanks." Jackie said as she quickly pulled her arms through the sleeves.

"I'm not getting that back am I?" Marco asked.

"Ask again in a few years." Jackie replied with a smirk as the two skated into the school's parking lot.

As the two had decided to take the scenic route, the majority of the student body was present. As the couple walked inside, Marco noticed that the majority of the male students were looking at him and noticing that Jackie was once more wearing his jacket. "Um, Jackie. Everyone's staring."

Jackie stopped and turned to face her boyfriend and said with a smirk, "Let them," before she pulled Marco into a deep kiss. While Marco was in heaven, almost all of the male students became enraged and started forming together for a Bro Code.

Once Jackie released Marco, he asked, "I take it that's revenge for the tank thing?"

Jackie only smiled as she said, "You know me so well." Marco would have responded but had to skate away as the Bro Code mob had formed and was out for blood.

"I can't believe you're dating a loser like Diaz." Brittney Wong said as she walked up to Jackie.

"Really?" Jackie began. "You think that one of the sweetest guys at this school, who's a blue belt in karate and can do something like that," Jackie motioned to where Marco jumped over Oscar's car, high fiving the boy in the process, in order to avoid Justin, "is a loser? I think you need to look again Brittney."

Brittney's mouth hung open for a few minutes until she grunted in frustration and stomped away. Jackie only smiled as she watched her boyfriend almost effortlessly avoid the perusing mob until the first period bell. As she walked to the gym, Jackie realized that this was the happiest she had been in a long time. She had her board, she had her friends, she had the love of the boy she had connected to so long ago. In that moment, Jackie came to realize something that she thought would never happen, she was glad that she ran away because she found her home.

* * *

Epilogue

Marco Diaz stared out into the ocean, nervous about what the day would bring. At 28 the only really change to the man was his growth. He had a substantial amount of muscle, however he took after his mother's side of the family resulting in his appearance being more of a swimmer than a body builder like his father. He was broken from his thoughts when a voice behind him called out, "Are you just going to stand there or are you going to help me with these boards?"

Marco turned to see Jackie, his wife of ten years, trying to untie the surfboards from the car's roof. Like Marco, the only real change to Jackie over the years was her height, although she had allowed her hair to grow past her shoulders. A lot of their friends thought they weren't making the best choice to get married during their senior year, but both knew there was no one else for each other. Sure, they had their disagreements like any other couple, but they were able to work through them and often didn't remember what the fights were about.

The ceremony wasn't that big either, just a small affair with family and a few close friends. After a long debate they did send an invitation to Jackie's parents, they never got a response. After they graduated High School, they decided to travel the country. Jackie just wanted to see everything since she was stuck in Echo Creek, Marco won a number of martial arts tournaments while he got his business degree online.

After a few years traveling, they returned to Echo Creek and bought a modest house. Marco now owned and ran a small dojo. It was large enough to provide a large income for Marco to support his family while small enough so that Marco could give each student individual attention and allow him to travel for the occasional karate tournament to supplement his income so his family could enjoy life.

As Marco admired how his wife's simple black bikini showed off her curves, he asked, "How did I ever get so lucky to get a woman like you?"

"You did something incredibly stupid, waited a few years, then did another incredibly stupid thing." Jackie said before she looked at her husband as he helped with the boards. As she grabbed her white board with a lime green racing stripe she said, "Marco, you need to relax honey."

As Marco grabbed his black board with a red racing stripe he responded, "I am relaxed, but I'm also worried. What if she gets caught in a riptide?"

"Then I'll let me tail out and swim after her." Marco and Jackie were extremely grateful that Janna was able to upgrade Jackie's necklace when she made the new ones. Of course everything had a price, the first necklace was for Janna being the maid of honor, Star didn't mind since she was sitting on Marco's side of the aisle. The second necklace was for having priority when choosing a babysitter. The third necklace was for agreeing never to ask the witch-in-training to babysit until the kids where at least four. "I really don't see what the problem is, you were skateboarding when you were only six."

"But what if she falls off her board? She could drown." Marco almost screamed. His wife only raised an eyebrow, as if to say, 'Really?' causing Marco to sight before saying, "Okay so I'm a little worried."

Jackie shook her head as she said, "Don't worry honey, she is our daughter."

"Yeah daddy," eight year old Isabella Diaz said as she got her black and lime green stripped boogie board out of the trunk, "I'll be fine. And you and mommy are here to keep me safe. Now come on." The girl had inherited her mother's eyes and her father's hair, even if it did have a green streak in it, three freckles were also present on both her checks. She was currently jumping from one foot to the other, waiting to try out her new board and one-piece swimsuit she had gotten yesterday.

Jackie gave a light laugh as she said, "Be patient dear, we have to wait for your little brother's sitter before we get in the water." As she talked, Jackie pulled her two-year-old son, Marco Jr., out of his car seat. The boy was almost a carbon copy of his father, the only difference being his blonde hair that, like his sister's, also had a green streak.

As the family of four stepped out onto the beach, a portal opened behind them. Turning around, Isabella cried out, "Aunt Star!" as she crash hugged the princess.

"Hello little Izzy, you've gotten so big since I last saw you." Star said as she returned the hug. After High School ended Star matured a lot. She still went out monster hunting, but she was much more responsible and was a kind and wise leader to her people. Knowing of her favorite couples plans, she left a small mirror behind so that they could keep in touch, and gave them a pair of interdimensional scissors once they bought a house. "Oh, and here's Junior." Star said once she saw the boy in Jackie's arms.

"Thanks for looking after him Star." Jackie said.

Star waved off her friends words, "Who else are you going to have watch him while you're in the water? Ludo?" Star then smirked as she looked to Marco and said, "Just remember I might ask you to return the favor someday."

The couple only chuckled, remembering some of the antics they saw Star get into when she was younger via the machine in Father Time's dimension. "Really, we appreciate it Star." Marco said.

"Just go have fun already." Star told the family as she took Marco Jr. out of his mother's arms. Isabella didn't need to be told twice as she charged into the water, Jackie following after to make sure the girl didn't go out to far. Marco only chuckled as he slowly walked into the surf. 'To think,' the man thought, 'I have such a good life because of something stupid I did as a kid.'

* * *

 **And that's the end of chapter 5, with 24 pages.**

 **With the end of this chapter comes the end to my first completed fanfiction. I'm happy that I finally got an idea from my head from conception to completion. I hope everyone enjoyed my summer of focusing my attention on one fic. After a few days rest I'll get to writing a new update for one of my other fics. I'm a little undecided as to which story to update first so be sure to vote in my poll if you haven't already.**

 **I want to thank everyone who has read this story, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I would also like to personally thank** **Eretsonoferet,** **The Keeper of Worlds,** **animesguardianangel** **,** **Kieran Wespell** **,** **Gold Testament** **,** **The Night Gaunt** **,** **Ultimate Warrior of Zera** **, my guest reviewers, Luigi S Mariano, and JW TS for leaving reviews. Like any other author on this site I enjoyed knowing your reactions and thoughts to what I have created.**

 **I would also like to thank whoever it was that recommended my story on the site "TV Tropes." On that site they had the username ultimomant. I know that while I have some writing skills that I'm not the best author on this site, and to have a recommendation on a different site is just mind blowing. Again, thank you.**

 **Well that's about everything I had left to say about this story. Again, I hope everyone has enjoyed it. I think everything tied up quite nicely and I'm happy how I ended things. I might do a one-shot or two based on this story but that's in the future.**

 **With this story complete, here's acw28 saying, "until next update."**


	6. SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT!

**Hello everyone, it's acw28 here with an important announcement.**

 **After the insanity of the last few weeks of the previous semester, I finally had some time to write out a few of my ideas. It took a while, but I finally finished the first "mid-quel" to this story. If you are interested in reading** _ **The 100-Man Kumite**_ **, you can find it either on my profile or in the Star vs. the Forces of Evil and Randy Cunningham crossover section.**

 **As the site admins forbid people from only posting author's notes, I figured I'd give everyone a sneak preview of the story.**

* * *

17-year-old Marco Diaz breathed out slowly as he watched his opponent rush toward him, a slight twitch of a muscle told the boy that the opponent would launch an attack from the right. With this in mind, Marco acted accordingly. Quickly stepping forward to meet his opponent's attack, Marco raised his left forearm to interrupt the overhead chop, then retaliated with three quick hits to his opponents midsection before quickly kicking the other boy aside.

As Marco settled back into his ready stance, he heard clapping to the side, the source a slightly overweight man wearing a black karate uniform with a red belt. "Very good Diaz." Once Marco heard this, he immediately relaxed before bowing to his sensei, then turning and bowing to his bruised sparring partner. Marco was about to walk back to the bleachers, only to hear his sensei say, "Wait a minute Diaz." Once everyone else was seated, the man continued, "You have been a member of this dojo for the past several years. In that time I have watched you practice uncountable hours in what I have instructed you in. I have watched you overcome obstacles most wouldn't even attempt. This last spar has shown me that you have truly mastered this dojo's style. I am proud to present you with this," here the sensei pulled something out from behind his back, "black belt. Congratulations Diaz, you've earned it."

* * *

 **So what happens next?**

 **Why does the mid-quel have such a strange title?**

 **How is this a crossover?**

 **To find out the answers to these questions and more, you're going to have to read** _ **The 100-Man Kumite**_ **! I hope everyone enjoys my latest crazy story, and that I continue to entertain with my ideas. So until I have the time to get another chapter typed up, here's acw28 saying, "until next update."**


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